The Ruby Pendant
by Elizabeth Joan-hbndgirl
Summary: Frank and Joe and their friends are on a trip to a small country in Eastern Europe. When a priceless artifact is stolen, the Hardys' friends are held hostage until the boys can recover the artifact. But that's only the beginning.
1. Chapter 1

J.M.J.

_A/N: Hello! Welcome to my newest story! This story is (as I plan it) the beginning of a new series which will also include Nancy Drew, although she's not in this story yet. I realize that the average American high school doesn't send students on school trips to foreign countries, but more unlikely things have happened in the Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew universe. It'll be a fun ride, though, so I hope you stick around for it. As always, I will appreciate any feedback in the form of reviews, as well as follows and favorites. Thank you so much for reading and I hope you enjoy!_

_**The Ruby Pendant**_

**Chapter I**

Darrin Byron was tapping his foot impatiently and glancing at his wristwatch. He wasn't liking this whole trip much, even if it was his own idea, and the waiting was making him nervous.

He was the political science teacher for Bayport High School. Over a year ago, he had thought that it would be a great opportunity to take some of the juniors and seniors on a class trip to another country over the summer to learn about that country's political system. The school board had looked into the cheapest possible option for doing so and had settled on just about the worst possible one, in Mr. Byron's opinion. The federal government was putting together a program to send students to a small eastern European country called Laurenia to help build housing and waterways for the poor. It had been an Iron Curtain country back in the Cold War days, but in recent years its government seemed to be trying to shape itself up and get along with the West better, but Mr. Byron still had his doubts. The fact that he and his students had been separated from the groups that had come from other schools wasn't helping matters any, either, nor was the rule that all the American students had to wear badges declaring their nationality.

"I don't know why they agreed to let high school students in on this program," Mr. Byron muttered under his breath.

One of his students, seventeen-year-old Joe Hardy, overheard him. "Hey, everything seems to be fine, Mr. Myron. Everybody seems happy we're here. No one's bothering us."

"Yeah," Mr. Byron admitted, although he was still unconvinced. For the sake of his students, he realized he had to put on the best face he could. "Of course, it's all fine. We're here on a program that has been put together by a joint effort between the United States government and the Laurenian government. The Laurenians aren't going to let anything happen to us. I'm just getting a little impatient waiting for the girls, that's all."

He and the boys in the group had already assembled in the lobby of the hotel, but the girls had yet to put in an appearance.

"They'll be here in a minute," one of the other boys, Chet Morton, assured him. His sister, Iola, was one of the girls in question. "Probably two of them just wound up wearing matching clothes and then they had to change and all the others are waiting for them." He grinned more than the comment should have warranted, but then so did all the other boys in hearing distance. When they had heard about the badges, every single one of them had bought matching t-shirts with the American flag on them and they were all wearing them today, "just to be sure they were following the rules," as they had told Mr. Byron.

"Besides," another boy, Biff Hooper, spoke up, "if anybody's going to get into trouble, it'll be us instead of the girls. We're the ones who have Frank and Joe Hardy with us."

As the others chuckled knowingly, the Hardys grinned a bit self-consciously. They had a penchant for getting into unexpected adventures and mysteries. Their dad, Fenton Hardy, was a former officer with the NYPD who had become a private investigator. Even though they were only eighteen and seventeen, respectively, Frank and Joe were already following in their dad's footsteps.

"We're not going to have any adventures or mysteries or anything like that this trip," Mr. Byron said, although it was obvious to all the students that he was the least convinced of this of any of them.

"From the way Mr. Byron's acting, you'd think we'd been dropped right into the middle of the Soviet Union in the 1960's," Phil Cohen said in a low voice to the other boys standing near him.

"I don't really get it," Frank Hardy agreed. "Laurenia doesn't have a very good history, of course, but they've done a lot of work reforming their government. They've got a democracy now and are trying hard both to get along with and learn from other countries, as well as take care of their citizens. That's what this whole program is about."

Speculation was cut short by the arrival of the girls in the lobby. There were twenty-three students in the group, fourteen boys and nine girls. All of the Hardys' particularly close friends had signed up for the program, including Chet, Biff, Phil, Tony Prito, Jerry Gilroy, and Jim Foy, as well as Callie Shaw, Frank's girlfriend, and Iola Morton, Chet's sister and Joe's girlfriend, plus Vanessa Bender, who had just moved to Bayport and had already become close friends with Callie and Iola.

"We've been waiting forever," Chet complained even though it had only been about ten minutes. "What took you so long?"

Dark-haired Iola rolled her eyes but didn't answer. Callie, Vanessa, and several of the other girls exchanged glances while one girl, Kristen Meyers, folded her arms and did her best not to make eye contact with anyone.

Finally, Callie, who was probably the most diplomatic of the group said, "There was just a little misunderstanding. It wasn't a big thing."

"I'll tell you about it later," Iola whispered to Chet and Joe, who were standing nearest to her.

"Okay, gather up, everybody," Mr. Byron said. "Here's the plan for today. Since we got in late last night after a long day of traveling, our liaison with the Laurenian government, Illya Láska, who will be meeting us here at the hotel in a moment, has arranged for us to spend today seeing some of the sights of the city here. He'll act as our guide for today, and then we will get to work on our project first thing tomorrow."

"See, we aren't that late," Callie said teasingly to Frank. "Even our guide is later than we are. Hey, wait." She glanced at his shirt and all the other boys' shirts. "You guys are really going through with it? All fourteen of you wearing matching shirts?"

Frank shrugged and tried not to grin. "There was no getting out of it. What difference does it make, anyway?"

"None, I guess." But Callie still shook her head.

About a minute later, a fair-haired man in a suit with a name badge on his lapel came through the outside door into the lobby. He came straight toward the group of students and addressed their teacher in a heavy accent, "Mr. Byron? My name is Illya Láska."

Mr. Byron held out his hand for the liaison to shake. "Yes, Mr. Láska, it's good to meet you. Thank you for putting together everything you have for us."

"It's no trouble. You can all call me Illya. Are you all ready to go?"

"I believe so," Mr. Byron replied.

"Good. I have arranged for us to use a bus. That way I will not have to ask you to drive, Mr. Byron. The traffic in our city can be difficult at times. This way, everyone."

They followed him outside to an old school bus which was parked right in front of the hotel. They all piled inside, and Frank, Joe, Callie, and Iola found themselves in the very front seats, directly behind the driver's seat.

"You speak very good English, Illya," Callie complimented their driver as he pulled the bus into the street.

"Thank you," Illya replied, checking over his shoulder for oncoming vehicles. "I spent most of my college years studying in the U.K. and Australia. That experience is why I got this job."

"It must be an interesting job," Joe commented. "Do you ever get to be liaison for important visitors, or just people like us?"

"Mostly people like you," Illya said.

"That seems kind of funny," Joe went on. "Your country must have a lot of exchange programs with other countries then."

"Yes," Illya replied, but rather than offering any more information on that, he began explaining what some of the landmarks they were passing by were, and soon all the students were so interested in what he was saying that all but Frank and Joe forgot to wonder about what he wasn't saying.

Finally, he stopped the bus in front of a large, castle-like building. "This is the _Múzeum Umenia a Histórie_, the Museum of Art and History. I have arranged for admission for all of us. You will learn a great deal about our country's history and culture here and, I hope, share some of the history and culture of your own country."

"Was this place once a castle?" Vanessa asked him as they all got out of the bus.

"Yes," Illya told her. "The castle was once the whole city, but of course the city has grown much larger since then. For many years, the castle was used as the government building for the city, but about fifty years ago, all of those offices were move to a more modern building in what is now the center of town. The castle was converted in a museum."

He led them into the massive structure. The old gateway had been made into a gatehouse, and a woman was sitting in it to take tickets. Illya spoke to her in their native language, and she checked a list before letting them through.

"We don't have to pay?" Mr. Byron asked in some confusion.

"Since you are guests of the government and this is a government-run museum so you don't have to pay," Illya explained. He turned so that he could see the entire group. "As you can see, the museum is very large. It will not be possible to see all of it today. Would you prefer to explore it on your own or have me guide you?"

The students looked at one another, waiting to see if someone would step up as leader and decide for all of them. After Illya had begun to look impatient, Frank stepped forward.

"I think we'd all rather have a guide. We'll learn a lot more that way."

"Very well," Illya agreed. "Although if anyone wants to leave the group at any point, we must all meet here at the front gate by twelve o'clock. There is much left that we will want to see."

The group started off with Illya explaining many of the artifacts and pieces of art to the students. A few of them listened with rapt attention, but not all. Mr. Byron had to tell a few of them to stop horsing around, and a few others wandered off on their own or lingered behind to look at something that had particularly caught their attention.

Despite the fact that Frank was the one who had spoken up in favor of a tour guide, he was also one of the ones who lingered behind. The exhibit that had caught his attention, as well as the attention of Joe, Callie, Iola, and Chet, was one on World War II. It was one of the most extensive they had ever seen, even including airplanes and a tank from the era.

"I wish Illya was still here," Frank commented. "I'd like to ask him about his country's involvement in the war."

"Look at this!" Joe was leaning close to the glass of one of the exhibits. "It's an Enigma machine."

"That's cool." Iola peered at it as well. "Those are the coding machine the Germans used that were practically unbreakable, right? But didn't the Allies eventually break the code?"

"Actually, the Poles broke the code before the war even started," Joe told her. "If I'm remembering right, the Allies also captured some cipher keys."

Chet had been examining the engine of one of the planes, but he now stood up. "Are you girls ever going to tell us what happened this morning, why you took so long to get down to the lobby and were all so uptight when you did get down there?"

Iola rolled her eyes. "You would have to bring that up again, Chet. I'd almost forgotten about it."

"It wasn't much worth remembering," Callie said. "Like I said this morning, it was just a misunderstanding."

"No, it wasn't," Iola insisted. "It was Kristen Meyers. She was being rude to Van again. As usual."

"What does Kristen have against Vanessa?" Frank asked.

Iola shrugged. "That Van's new in Bayport and everybody likes her and Kristen has lived here her whole life and nobody likes her."

"That's not true, Iola," Callie broke in. "It's not that everyone dislikes Kristen. She just has a hard time opening up to people. And I don't know what she has against Vanessa. Whatever it is, I'm sure it's just a misunderstanding, or a maybe a personality clash. Van's so outgoing and Kristen is so reserved that I could see how Van might make her uncomfortable."

"Well, whatever the reason, Kristen's still a pain," Iola insisted. "You guys should realize that."

"Not necessarily," Joe admitted. "Even though Kristen's in the same grade as me, I think I've maybe had, like, one class with her, and she never talked in that class when she could possibly avoid it. Honestly, I don't think I've ever talked to her."

"Me neither," Chet agreed, "but I've always thought she was cute."

Iola made a face. "Ew. How could my own brother have a crush on someone like that?"

Callie cast a pleading look at Frank, who took his cue from her. "I think we'd better catch up to the rest of the group now."

"Good idea." Callie gave him a grateful smile.

The five of them began following after the group, which had gone on into another room. All at once, there was a loud sort of pop from outside that brought them all to a standstill.

"What was…?" Iola began, but Joe had already shouted, "Gunshot!" and darted to the nearest window.

Frank followed him. Both boys were careful not to let themselves be seen by whoever was outside the window, which overlooked the courtyard. By this time, there had been several more gunshots and several people had begun screaming. As Frank and Joe looked out, they saw about a dozen people in tactical gear and full-face masks holding automatic rifles on the tourists and employees in the courtyard. The Hardys backed away from the window.

"What's going on?" Callie stepped forward and grasped Frank's arm.

"It looks like the museum is under attack," Frank replied.


	2. Chapter 2

J.M.J.

_A/N: Thank you for continuing to read! Thank you particularly to Drumboy100 (no, Laurenia isn't a real country. Also, Frank and Callie are dating and Joe and Iola are dating. As for everyone else, who/if they're dating doesn't really play into the story), Cherylann Rivers, BMSH, angelicalkiss, LaurieQ, and max2013 for your reviews on the first chapter! I'm very excited to be back as well!_

**Chapter II**

"What do we do?" Iola asked, instinctively dropping her voice to a whisper. She stared at the window from which Frank and Joe had seen the gunmen as if she expected them to come through it.

"We don't know what they're after," Frank said. "Chances are, it's not us, so they might just let us all go."

"'Might' isn't very comforting," Chet pointed out.

"He's right," Joe agreed. "We need to take whatever precautions we can." He looked around and spotted a large vent high up in the wall. He pointed to it. "Maybe we could hide in there until we know what's going on."

"I don't think I'd fit in there," Chet protested.

"I don't think so," Frank agreed. "For that matter, I doubt Joe and I would fit, even if we had a way to get up there. But the girls could probably hide in there."

"We're not going to hide if you guys can't," Callie insisted. "There has to be another way."

"Maybe," Frank said, "and we'll try to figure it out if there is, but for now you two might as well try to hide."

"That way, if those guys out there don't just let us go, you two will still be free to go for help," Joe added. "Come on. This could be our best chance to get away."

Callie and Iola both tried to protest, but the boys insisted and the girls had to admit that having some of them free would be the best chance for all of them. With the boys' help, they removed the cover from the vent and climbed up inside it. Iola went first and had to scoot a long way in to make room for Callie. The vent was much too narrow for the girls to be side-by-side, and of course they couldn't turn around. Callie was wondering just how they would get out again if it did turn out to be necessary for the girls to go for help, but there was no time to ask about that. Just as Frank was finishing putting the cover back in place, two of the gunmen burst into the room.

Frank, Joe, and Chet put their hands in the air as the men shouted something at them in the Laurenian language. One of the men came forward and pushed each boy to his knees in turn and then searched them for weapons. One of them asked them something or perhaps ordered them to do something, but none of the boys understood.

"We are Americans," Frank tried to tell them very slowly, hoping they would understand that he didn't speak their language. "We speak English."

The two gunmen held a brief consultation and then one of them gestured for the boys to stand up. Then they prodded and pushed them into the main lobby of that wing of the museum where the rest of the Bayport High group as well as a number of other tourists had been gathered. Frank, Joe, and Chet hurried toward the rest of their group.

Most of the students were pale and tense and standing very close together. Mr. Byron was wringing his hands and muttering something that sounded like, "I _knew_ something like this would happen. I told them, and they didn't listen."

"Where are Callie and Iola?" Vanessa whispered as the three boys joined the group.

"Safe for the moment," Joe whispered back. "Hopefully, these guys won't realize that they haven't got everybody."

The only one in the room who seemed wholly unconcerned was the government liaison, Illya Láska. He was standing with his arms crossed and he looked annoyed rather than alarmed. He was even tapping his foot as if he was impatient for something to happen.

One of the gunmen approached and said in English, "You are the American students?"

"That's right," Mr. Byron told him. "We don't know what's going on here, but I'm sure it doesn't concern us. You may as well let us all go."

The gunman consulted a clipboard that he was holding and then looked up at the group of students and counted them. "It says here that twenty-three students were admitted into the museum, but there are only twenty-one here."

"There was a miscount," Illya spoke up quickly. "The entire group is twenty-three, counting the twenty-one students, the teacher, and myself. The woman at the gate must have misunderstood when I told her that."

"And just who are you?" the gunman said.

"Liaison from the government," Illya admitted.

The gunman paused and looked him over. "That is a bold thing to admit."

Illya shrugged. "I can see no reason for denying it. You will see who I am as soon as you look at my papers."

"Speaking of which…" The gunman roughly pulled Illya's jacket open and searched his pockets for his wallet. He removed the papers from it and examined them. "You are indeed a government official."

"If I was to lie to you, telling you that I was a government official when I was not would not be the lie I would tell."

"One can never tell." The gunman stuffed the wallet into his pocket. Then he turned again to Mr. Byron. "Where there is one government official, there are usually more. Your badge showing that you are an American citizen and your passport and those of your students."

"I'm not giving these losers my passport," Biff grumbled.

"It's not going to do you much good if they shoot you," Joe told him. "Better do what they tell you."

"Listen to your friend," the gunman said.

The students handed over their identification papers, and when he had satisfied himself that they were genuine, the gunman handed them back. Then he turned once again to Illya and began speaking to him in their native language. Illya almost showed some emotion as he responded, but he swiftly covered it with his typically stoicism.

Whatever Illya had told him, it seemed to anger the gunman. He grabbed him by the shoulder and pushed him toward a hallway that was blocked off by tape and presumably closed. Another gunman followed them with his weapon at the ready.

"What do you think is going on?" Phil whispered to Frank, but an angry shout and a glare from one of the remaining gunmen prevented Frank from answering.

That didn't prevent Frank and Joe from exchanging glances to try to figure out what each other were thinking. They had worked together on enough cases that they usually had a good idea of what the other was thinking, but this time they were on different tracks. Frank's main concern was why masked gunmen would come bursting into a museum like this while Joe was trying to figure out how far they could trust each of their companions if they were to devise an escape plan.

A moment later, they heard angry shouts from the two gunmen who had disappeared with Illya. After a few minutes of shouting, they returned, dragging Illya with them. They began shouting at either the hostages or their own men, and though none of the Americans could understand a word of it, it was obvious that the news was welcome to neither the hostages nor the gunmen.

"What's going on?" Mr. Byron asked, stepping in front of his students. "Whatever it is, my students and I couldn't possibly be involved. We never went into that wing."

"No, it's none of your doing," Illya agreed. "The purpose of these men is just foiled. That is all. I, for one, am just as glad. I'd rather a thief with the decency to steal it secretly rather than terrorists have it."

The gunmen who spoke English cuffed him across the face. "We are not terrorists or thieves. We are patriots if a…a worm like you can understand the word."

Joe stepped forward. "Wait. Something's been stolen?"

"Not just something," the gunman told him. "It is the most valuable item in all of Laurenia: the Ruby Pendant."

"What makes it so valuable?" Frank asked.

"It was passed down from generation to generation of our kings and queens from the ninth century on when Laurenia was still a monarchy," the gunman explained. "It is a symbol of the old customs and traditions of our country."

"So, it was on display here in the museum?" Frank asked. "When did it go missing?"

"Yes, when?" the gunman repeated as he turned to Illya.

Illya shrugged. "I presume last night or this morning since I hadn't heard about it. However, I do not work for the museum and do not know everything about it. As I told you, it is possible that it was moved because of the renovation work that is being done in that part of the museum."

"Wait, wait, wait," Joe said. "We need the whole story from the beginning here. We need to know more about this pendant thing and the museum and what's been going on around here and the security system and who would have had access…"

"Why do you sound like a police officer?" the gunman interrupted him.

Frank and Joe glanced at one another. "Habit, I guess," Joe said finally.

"Are you detectives of some kind?" the gunman asked.

"Amateurs," Frank admitted.

"Excellent," the gunman said. "You will help us find the Pendant."

"Only if you give your word that you will let all the hostages go if we do," Frank replied.

"The Laurenian civilians, we have every intention of releasing as soon as is safely possible," the gunman explained. "We are, as I said, patriots, not terrorists, and our primary concern is for our people. The government officials are traitors and enemies to our country. They will be dealt with accordingly. As for you and your friends, we have no love of Americans, but we will release all of you if you will help us find the Pendant."

"And if we don't?" Joe asked.

"You will be dealt with along with the rest of the enemies of our country."

"We need to talk this over," Frank told him and pulled Joe back.

"I'm going to have to insist that you cooperate with these people fully," Mr. Byron told them. "If that will ensure the safety of all of my students, then it's really the only thing we can do."

"But who are these people?" Frank asked. "What do they want this pendant for? Most of all, what guarantee would we have that they'd keep their word?"

"Besides that, I wouldn't mind getting this pendant thing back for the museum, but I'm not too excited about the idea of getting it for people like this," Joe added.

Mr. Byron bit his lip. "I suppose you've got some good points there. Whoever these people are, they don't look too trustworthy, and they certainly don't seem to have any right to this pendant."

"Who cares about some old pendant?" Kristen Meyers spoke up. It was such an unusual thing for her to do that everyone turned to look at her. "None of us even heard of it until these guys brought it up."

"None of us really know very much about the history of Laurenia," Frank pointed out. "It sounds like it's pretty important to the people here."

"More important than our lives?" Vanessa asked.

"Of course not," Mr. Byron replied. "Our first priority needs to be to get out of here safely."

"The authorities must have some idea what's going on by now," Jerry Gilroy said. "What do you think the chances of them getting us out are?"

"This place is a literal fortress," Joe told him. "And it looks like there's enough of these guys to defend it. Even the military would have a tough time getting in here. Still, they might get us out if we can buy some time."

Frank nodded. "Working on the case would be a good way to stall off whatever these people have planned, both for us and for the government officials. If we can convince these gunmen that we need to talk to the officials, maybe they won't hurt them before we can all get rescued."

"All right," Mr. Byron agreed. "That's the best plan. Of course, if it comes down to it and you're out of other options, you might have to actually give them the pendant."

"_If_ we find it," Joe reminded him.

"Okay," Frank said more loudly, turning toward the gunman. "We'll help you in exchange for our freedom, our classmates', and Mr. Byron's."

"Good," the gunman said. "You two will stay here and tell me what you need. Your friends will be locked up in another part of the castle. We will take the Laurenians to another part of the castle again where we will question them and determine which ones are civilians and which work for the government. As for Láska here…" He looked at Illya.

"The Americans do not speak our language," Illya said, as unruffled as ever. "They will need an interpreter in their investigation."

"I can serve as interpreter," the gunman replied.

"In this case, I think we'd like to have a second opinion," Frank told him. "That will cut down on mistranslations." Unintentional or otherwise, Frank might have added, but he had enough sense not to.

"Very well." The leader of the gunmen gave his orders in his own language, and the hostages were taken away until it was just the Hardys, Illya, and two of the masked men. "What do you need first?" he then asked Frank and Joe.

"Some background on the pendant and on you people," Frank told him. "Then we'll need to see the scene of the crime and talk to everyone in the museum."


	3. Chapter 3

J.M.J.

_A/N: Thank you so much for continuing to read! Thank you especially to max2013, Cherylann Rivers, Drumboy100, and EvergreenDreamweaver (haha – I love _The Man from U.N.C.L.E._) for your reviews since I posted the last chapter! On a side note, sorry I'm taking a little longer to update this story than I usually do. I'm a little bit busier these days than I was, but I'll keep updating as quickly as I can._

**Chapter III**

"This would be a lot easier if your guy wasn't pointing a machine gun at us," Joe said.

He and Frank, along with Illya and the one gunman who could speak English, were seated around a small table in the wing of the museum from which the Ruby Pendant had been taken. The only other person in the room was another gunman who was training his machine gun on the Hardys and Illya. The first gunman spoke to his companion in their language, and the gun was reluctantly lowered.

Frank took in a relieved breath. "All right. First things first. Is there a name we can call you? It will make things easier for us."

"Otherwise, I'll just have to make up a name for you, and that might not be too flattering," Joe added.

The gunman was still wearing his mask, and so it was hard to tell exactly what he was thinking. Finally, he said, "Demyan. It makes no difference whether that is my real name or not. If you must call me something, that will do."

Frank had had a faint hope that the gunman – or Demyan, as he had requested to be called – might by some chance give his full, correct name, but clearly the man was more cautious than that. However, he hadn't counted on it much, and so it wasn't difficult to keep any disappointment from showing. "Now we need some background information, first on this pendant and then on you."

"Láska here can tell you about the Pendant better than I," Demyan said.

"Every school child in our country knows the story," Illya replied.

Demyan tapped his fingers on the table. "Every school child knows a story. It's hardly the true story. I would think that an official of our government would, at least, know the truth."

"The story is simple," Illya said. "The Pendant was made in the ninth century for one of our kings on the occasion of his coronation. It was handed down from generation to generation of Laurenian royalty for the next thousand years and became the symbol of our kings, and in a way, Laurenia itself.

"Our last king, King Alfonz VI, reigned during the second World War. Laurenia was hurt badly in both world wars, but the even worse in the second. For four years in a row, our crops were destroyed or there was simply no one to gather them in. Our people went hungry, and when the War was over, those who had not been killed or starved already were forced to pay exorbitant prices for the bare essentials of life. They expected any moment that a larger nation would come in and annex our country, and many people felt that would not be such a bad alternative. Alfonz was weak, and though there was admittedly little enough he could have done for his people, he didn't even do that much.

"Some of our people were radicalized by Russian Communism. They were young and full of energy, and so they met little resistance from a people who were tired and beaten as a whole when they mounted a revolution in the early '50s. They killed the king and queen and their children, the oldest of whom was eleven, and threw their bodies down a well, along with the Pendant, though their fate was not discovered until after the Communist government was overthrown in the '80s. Later in 1996, the bodies and the Pendant were discovered in the well and after being restored, the Pendant was placed in the museum here."

Demyan scoffed and shook his head. "You are not telling me that you actually believe those lies that they tell to children?"

"That is what happened," Illya said in bored voice. "Why should I disbelieve it?"

Demyan slammed his fist against the table. "It's all lies! There is no democracy in Laurenia! There is no justice! Those revolutionaries were right in opposing the king!"

"Okay, okay," Frank said. "We don't know about all of that, and we don't really care. The king has been dead for almost seventy years, it sounds like. Why do you want his pendant?"

"To sell," Demyan explained, composing himself a bit. "It is worth a great deal of money, not only for its historic significance. You can see a picture of it there on the wall, next to where it was displayed."

Frank and Joe both stood up to go take a closer look at the board next to the display of the Ruby Pendant. It presumably explained the story behind the Pendant, but it was in the Laurenian language, and so neither of the boys could read it. The picture showed that the Pendant had been a large ruby in an ornate gold setting which was decoration with numerous symbols of royalty such as crowns and scepters as well as several figures of lions and eagles.

"So, you're just in this whole thing for the money?" Joe asked. "Then why sell it? Why not just ransom in back to the government? They'd probably pay you more than any collector would and definitely more than if you disassembled the Pendant."

"This is not just for the money," Demyan told him. "The Ruby Pendant has always been the symbol of the tyrants who have exercised their will over Laurenia, whether the monarchy or our so-called democracy. We will take away their symbol and take away something of their spirit. We will teach them to fear us from the beginning. It is but poetic justice that the money we will get from selling it will fund our revolution against the current government."

"Oh, so you're starting a revolution," Joe said. "And this is all a statement. Except someone else already stole the Pendant and ruined your statement."

Demyan snorted. "I suppose one might put it that way, but the two of you will find it back for us."

"Maybe," Frank told him. "Like I said before, we're only amateurs. There's no guarantee that we'll find this pendant back for you."

"You had better hope for your sake and your friends' that you do," Demyan warned him.

"Okay, but there's one more thing we want to know before we get down to business about that," Joe said. "Just what sort of government are you planning on starting up once you've had your whole revolution?"

"The Communists were right," Demyan replied. "Any misery our country suffered was due to the lasting effects of a thousand years of tyranny. They needed time, not to be replaced."

"The Communists came into our country like a flock of vultures to pick whatever bones were left after two world wars nearly destroyed us," Illya said, his voice as cold as ice. "The Nazis themselves were scarcely more despicable enemies, and as far as our own country is concerned, the Communists did far more harm. Every one of them ought to have been hung from the nearest tree."

Demyan turned to face him. "Thank you. You have spared us the trouble of deciding which of traitors we will execute first."

Illya's face didn't change expression slightly. Frank and Joe, however, glanced at one another. If Illya wasn't careful, they might have a hard time convincing Demyan not to execute him immediately.

"Well, let's get to work on the investigation," Frank said. "We'll need to start by interviewing some of the museum employees and try to pinpoint a time when the Pendant was stolen. Then we'll have to work on determining who was in the museum at the time of the theft."

Ordinarily, one of the first things Frank and Joe would have done would have been to look at the security footage, as they had both noticed a security camera trained directly on where the Ruby Pendant had been displayed. With a little luck, the thief might not have noticed it and the whole crime might be on tape. In this case, though, they didn't want to speed up the investigation any more than they could help – at least not until they had come up with a plan. Both Frank and Joe were praying that the revolutionaries wouldn't think of the security footage.

HBHBHBHBHB

"Do you think we can get out of here now?" Iola whispered. She and Callie were still hiding in the vent, and she was feeling claustrophobic.

"I don't know," Callie replied. "I don't hear anyone out there, but that doesn't mean there isn't anybody. And what about security cameras? What if they see us on there?"

"We can't really do anything about that," Iola said. "We're not doing any good just staying here. We might as well try to get out."

"Wait. What about trying to call for help first?"

"Good idea." Iola pulled her phone out of her pocket and turned on the screen. "I don't have reception in here."

Callie also checked her phone. "Neither do I. I guess we'll have to try to not get caught long enough to call for help. But then, who would we call? In the U.S., we would call 911, but do they have a system like that here?"

"Even if they do, I wouldn't know what number to call," Iola replied. "Maybe we can find out somehow when we get out of this vent. The next question, then, is whether we should try to go out the way we came or go forward."

"The boys didn't fasten down the cover the way we came in," Callie said. "The other covers, if we could for sure get to them, probably would be fastened down. I think going back would be the only way to get out of here."

"Then you'll have to go first," Iola told her. "Let's get out of here."

Callie began crawling backward until her feet touched the grate that covered the vent. It had just been propped up and Callie was able to knock it over without much pressure. It fell down with a loud clatter that made both girls flinch.

"If that doesn't bring them running, nothing will," Iola said.

"That's not exactly comforting," Callie replied as she began lowering herself down from the vent.

Iola followed as quickly as she could, but it wasn't very fast. Callie helped her down from the vent, all the while looking over her shoulder to make sure none of the gunmen had heard the crash and were coming. Evidently, none of them had.

"That was lucky," Iola whispered. "Now what's our plan?"

Callie bit her lip and looked around her. "If we could find a phone book, it would probably tell us what number to call."

"If we can for sure read it," Iola pointed out.

"Or we could find somewhere where we can get an Internet connection," Callie said. "Either way, our best bet is going to be to find the security booth. If no one's in it, we can turn off the whole security camera system so the gunmen can't spy on us."

"Wait, no, I've got a better idea than that," Iola replied. "If there's no one in the security booth, we can just bar the door from the inside and hide in there. If we can't get reception on our cell phones, there should be phones in there and the information we need to call the authorities. Plus, we can monitor the security cameras ourselves and keep the authorities up to date on what's happening in here and where."

"Good thinking, if we can pull it off." Callie took in a deep breath. "I guess we're going to have to try anyway. The worst that can happen is that we'll just get captured like everybody else."

"There might be a few worse things that can happen," Iola reminded her. "But still, we'd better give it a try. Now, which way?"

Callie sighed. "I have no idea. I guess we just poke around until we find it and hope we don't run into any gunmen first. Maybe we could find a map that would help, if we could read it."

Nervous and doubtful about their chances of success, the girls set off through one of the doors leading out of the room.

HBHBHBHBHB

"I hate this," Jerry Gilroy complained. He was lying on his back on a low bunk in one of the cells in the lowest level of the castle. The dungeons had been set up exactly as they had been in the Middle Ages when they had been used to hold prisoners. The gunmen had found it handy when they were looking for a place to put their prisoners.

"Well, you're not the only one," Biff told him drily. "How come we always get the worst end of any Frank and Joe's cases?"

"I doubt they're exactly having a blast," Jim Foy pointed out.

"Right," Phil agreed. "Especially since the only plan anyone's come up with yet is to stall for time. That doesn't do much good unless someone does something with the time they buy for us."

"They took our phones away," Tony pointed out. "We could try to get out of here, I guess, but we'd be completely on our own, and we kind of stick out like a sore thumb. We're going to need an actual plan."

They all looked about them to see if anything in the cell would spark an idea. The five of them were locked in together, and because the walls between the cells were solid, they couldn't see anyone else in their group. Chet, Vanessa, Mr. Byron, and the rest were all split between four other cells.

"We could always try the old sick routine," Biff suggested. "If they've ever seen an American movie, it probably wouldn't work, but these guys don't really look like the sort who would watch American movies."

"Yeah, well, I think we can pass on that idea anyhow," Jim said.

"You know, I wonder…" Phil paused for a moment. "Hey, Jerry, get up."

"Why?" Jerry groaned.

"Just do it." Phil dragged him off the bunk and then turned bunk upside down. There was nothing underneath, and so he started taking the blankets off and shaking them out.

"What exactly are you doing?" Jerry asked.

"I thought maybe they would have a spare key hidden in here somewhere," Phil explained. "You know, in case one of the employees got locked in here by accident when no one else was around or something. The bunk's the only place I could think of."

"They could have hidden one behind a loose stone in the wall," Tony suggested. "We might as well look."


	4. Chapter 4

J.M.J.

_A/N: Thank you so much for continuing to read! In particular, thank you to max2013, EvergreenDreamweaver, Cherylann Rivers, LaurieQ, Drumboy100, and angelicalkiss for your reviews since I posted the last chapter!_

**Chapter IV**

"You know," Joe said in a low voice to Frank, "there's a good chance that this pendant thing isn't even in the museum anymore. It probably got stolen last night at the latest and the museum and the government just didn't announce the theft to the public."

The two of them were standing off by themselves a little way in the room that had previously housed the Ruby Pendant. Illya was still sitting at the table with one of the gunmen training his gun at him. Illya was still imperturbably calm. Demyan had left the room to bring in the first round of suspects.

"Illya said he didn't know anything about the theft," Frank pointed out.

Joe shrugged. "He could be lying. Or he might just not have known. If his job is being a liaison to high school students, I doubt he knows everything that goes on."

"To be honest, I doubt there's much that goes on that Illya doesn't know about," Frank said. "In fact, I'm wondering if he's as much of an innocent bystander in all of this as he's making himself out to be. He's too calm, like he knows he's safe."

Joe nodded. "We definitely need to keep an eye on him." He glanced over at Illya, who honestly looked bored. "Or maybe we should try the direct approach and just go right up to him and talk to him."

"With Demyan gone, it would be a good opportunity to talk to Illya without anyone else being able to understand what we're saying," Frank agreed.

"Okay. Let's do it." Joe strolled over to where Illya was sitting without any pretense of nonchalance, pulled out one of the chairs from the table, and sat in it backwards. He stared at Illya for a moment or two with his eyes narrowed and then said, "What's the deal with you? Why are you so calm? You're being held hostage by a bunch of revolutionaries who intend to execute you whether they get one of your national treasures or not, and said national treasure has been stolen. What about this situation isn't a crisis for you?"

Illya glanced down at the table. Then he looked up, almost smiled, and said with a shake of his head, "I don't like Americans."

"Uh, okay," Joe said. "Why don't you tell us how you really feel?"

"I just did," Illya replied in some confusion.

"Never mind," Frank broke in. "Do you have a point in saying that, or is it just an observation?"

"I don't like American's," Illya said again. "You're soft and spoiled. You talk well, but you know nothing of suffering, and you care nothing for the suffering of others."

Joe stood up. "Okay, wow. To begin with…"

"Let it go, Joe," Frank advised. "That's a pretty big accusation, Illya. What exactly do you mean?"

Illya paused for a moment. "You talk much about fighting for freedom, but most of you have never done so. Oh, sure, you have a military but most of your generation haven't joined it, and those who have don't necessarily expect to actually die to preserve their freedom. More Americans die of suicide now than in military service. We in Laurenia are not so lucky. We have been in almost constant war for over a century. Most of us expect to be killed at any time in an insurrection, because most of us have family or friends who have met precisely that fate. You Americans might help us. You talk so much as if you care about freedom and justice and human rights, and you know, having just one ally like the United States would be enough. Just knowing that a country like the U.S. would have our backs would be enough to deter cowardly revolutionaries like these people, and we might be able to hold a government together long enough to make something of it. But does your country give us help like that? No. They send their school children to build cheap housing for our poor, and by 'cheap housing' I mean housing made of cheap materials and which is owned by the government. The people who live in those apartments will be overcharged and the buildings not maintained. In a mere ten years, those buildings will be nothing more than rundown slums like our city – like our entire country – is already full of. And yet you wonder why I don't like Americans."

"You're not quite correct about that," Frank said.

"Not quite correct?" Joe burst out. "Everything you just said goes to show that you don't know anything about the American people or our politics or…or…"

"Actually," Frank interrupted him, "I think Illya has some fair points that deserve some fair answers, but I don't know what the answers are. That's a topic for a different conversation, though, sometime when we don't have a bunch of masked men pointing machine guns at us. When I said you were wrong, Illya, I meant the very last thing you said was wrong." When Illya gave him a curious look but no answer, Frank continued, "You said that we wondered why you disliked Americans. It's true that I asked you to clarify what you meant by saying that American are spoiled, but that's not really what we've been asking you about. We were asking you why you're so emotionless about everything that's happening, and I think everything you just said was an attempt to get us to forget that you never actually answered that question."

For the first time since they had seen him, Illya actually smiled. "You really do know what you're doing, don't you?" He paused again and the smile faded from his face. "If you're accusing me of being in with these terrorists, I find that deeply insulting three times over. First, I would never betray my country, particularly in such a foolish way as mounting a revolution. Second, I would never place either innocent people or irreplaceable historical objects in danger for any reason. Third, I would like to think that I'm a better actor than what you're giving me credit for. Moreover, I won't cooperate with you overly much in searching for the Pendant. As I said before, I would rather a common thief have it than these barbarians."

Frank and Joe weren't given a chance to respond as Demyan returned to the room at that moment with a woman in tow. She was around twenty-five years old with blonde hair and professional clothing. She looked terrified.

"She says her name is Natalia Stasiuk," Demyan explained. "She is one of the main historians for the museum and is an expert on the Ruby Pendant. She has been overseeing the renovations in this wing, and also she appears to speak English."

Frank pulled out a chair from the table. "Would you like to sit down, Ms. Stasiuk?" He stumbled a little over the name.

Natalia sat shakily in the offered chair. "Who are you?"

"I'm Frank Hardy. This is my brother, Joe. We're students here on an outreach program. Our dad's a detective, and we've learned a little bit about it from him. These people are holding our friends hostage unless we help them track down the Pendant."

"We're trying to find out exactly when the Pendant disappeared," Joe added. "It sounds like you might be able to help us with that?"

Natalia glanced over her shoulder at Demyan, who was standing right behind her.

"Just answer the question," Demyan growled at her.

"Hey, we can handle this ourselves," Joe told him.

Natalia put her face in her hands. "When these people found it missing was the first time anyone noticed. The workmen were just arriving for the day when these gunmen came in. The security cameras hadn't shown anything, and so no one had been back here yet today."

"Then the thief is probably still in the building," Demyan said with a note of triumph.

Frank and Joe exchanged glances.

"Possibly," Frank said. "It's more likely, though, that the Pendant was stolen last night and the thief got away."

"That's not possible," Natalia argued. "Our security is far too good for thieves to break in here at night. It had to have been one of the tourists this morning."

Frank was about to point out that obviously the museum's security wasn't that foolproof if no one had even bothered to check on a priceless artifact that morning, but he was interrupted by Illya saying something sharp in his own language. Natalia looked as if she had been slapped and she replied in the same language. Then Demyan jumped in and before long, all three of them plus the other masked man were all arguing in their own language.

Joe shrugged and turned to Frank. "At the rate this investigation is going, we'll never find that Pendant."

"Especially since I think the only statement anyone's made to us that we can believe completely is Illya saying he's not going to cooperate with us," Frank replied in a low voice.

"I think you're right," Joe agreed.

A cell phone rang, cutting both the Hardys' conversation and the argument short. Demyan reached into his pocket and took out a phone. He looked at the screen for a moment and then handed it to Illya who answered it after Demyan had given him some brief instructions.

"What's going on?" Joe asked Demyan.

"It is the government office he works for," Demyan said. "I have instructed him to tell them that we will kill every hostage in the museum if any attempt is made to rescue you. That should buy you all the time you'll need to find the Pendant."

"_If_ it's still in the building," Joe pointed out.

"You had better hope it is still in the building," Demyan replied.

"And after we find it, then what?" Frank asked. "Do you really expect the authorities to let you just walk away with it? Don't say you'll take hostages either. That's a bad bluff, and when they call it, you'll be out of luck. Either you'll not kill your hostages, in which case, they'll know you mean business, or you'll kill them, and then you won't have any more leverage."

Demyan nodded. "I'm impressed. It's not every school child who could reason that out so clearly. However, we have thought this plan out most carefully. We have a plan for our escape."

HBHBHBHBHB

Vanessa slapped the wall separating in which she was imprisoned from the one that most of the Hardys' friends were in. The boys were making a great deal of noise, and she was growing curious about what it was all about. "What are you guys doing in there? Trying to tear down the walls?"

"Looking for a spare key," Tony's voice came back through the wall.

"Well, that's a waste of time," Kristen Meyers grumbled. She was sitting on the one bunk in the cell with her arms crossed. Their other cellmates were Chet, Mr. Byron, and a Laurenian man who was in his mid- to late twenties and who had introduced himself as Marius Czajka.

Vanessa sighed. "That's not going to help now, Kristen."

"I don't think it is such a waste of time," Marius spoke up. He had been leaning against the wall in one of the back corners of the cell, but now he stood up straighter. "Getting these cell doors open even without a key wouldn't be so hard, but there would still be the question of how we can get away once they are open. There must be over a hundred people imprisoned in these dungeons. It's too many to get away unseen and too few to fight out way out, even if weren't all unarmed."

"Fighting our way out is strictly out of the question," Mr. Byron said. "I couldn't put my students in that kind of danger."

"Of course," Marius agreed. "But perhaps there is another way. There's a secret way out of this castle, if we can find it. If some of us could escape through it, they could tell the authorities, and the authorities could use it to come inside and rescue everyone who is left."

"Hold on a minute," Chet said. "Why do you know about a secret way out of this place? And besides that, how are you going to get the door open without a key? It's not like you can just take the door off its hinges."

"No," Marius replied. "But these are very old locks. They won't be hard to pick."

"How come you know how to pick a lock?" Vanessa asked.

"It's a useful skill to know," Marius said with a shrug. "Especially in my line of work."

"Which is…what?" Kristen asked. "Being a crook?"

Marius chuckled. "I've been accused of that in my work before, but no. I'm what you would call a contractor, I believe. I renovate buildings and such. It's my crew who is working on the renovations in this castle. That is also how I know about the secret passage. I've spent quite a bit of time in the last weeks looking over blueprints of this castle. The secret passage wasn't in all of the blueprints, which could mean that the entrance is sealed off. Still, I have a rough idea of where the entrance is and if I can get to it, I might be able to get into it anyway."

"Sounds good to me," Vanessa said. "Let's get out of here."

"You can count me in, too," Chet added. "Unless you think that's too many to go."

"You're not leaving me behind," Kristen protested. "I can't stay in this dungeon another minute."

"I think it would be best if all of us in this cell went," Marius replied. "That's five, which I don't think is too many, and it could be very bad for anyone who we leave behind."

"Hey, where does that leave us?" Biff objected from the other side of the wall. He and the other boys had been listening intently.

Marius bit his lip and frowned. "This cell is on the end of the block of cells. You may be able to feign ignorance. Hopefully, by the time our absence is discovered, we will be outside the castle and the authorities will be on their way in. But I don't think it would be wise to risk taking more than five."

"Then you'd better take another one of the students instead of me," Mr. Byron said. "It wouldn't be right for me to be safe on the outside while my students are in here."

"I understand how you feel," Marius said. "But to make such a choice as to which student will come will take more time than we have. Also, we may be safe once we get outside, but getting to safety will be far more dangerous than staying here."

"Speaking of which, they must have posted a guard," Kristen pointed out. "How are we going to get past them?"

"With prayer and a little luck." Marius winked. "All we can do is try. Do either of you girls have pins in your hair?"

Vanessa took two bobby pins out of her ash-blonde hair and handed them to Marius. Within moments, he had the lock open and the five of them slipped out into the hallway. They tiptoed to the door, and Marius opened it a crack to look out. There was no guard.

"These guys who are holding us must be really dumb," Kristen said, a little too loudly so that everyone else immediately shushed her.

Then Marius began leading them through the labyrinth of corridors, pausing at every corner to make sure no one was around it. Finally, he whispered, "I believe we're almost there. Now will come the hard part of trying to find the passage."

"Great," Kristen groaned and everyone shushed her again.

Marius had just stepped out from around the corner when two masked men stepped out from a corner a little way down the hall. For a split second, they all stared at one another. Then the masked men raised their guns and fired several shots just as Marius scrambled to safety.

"Quick!" He pointed to the nearest door. "In there!"


	5. Chapter 5

J.M.J.

_A/N: Thank you for reading and for being patient even though there was a little bit of a delay with this chapter. Thank you also to everyone who has left reviews since I posted the last chapter: max2013, Cub16, Cherylann Rivers, Drumboy100, EvergreenDreamweaver, angelicalkiss, and sm2003495!_

**Chapter V**

"Finally! The security booth!" Iola breathed a sigh of relief as she and Callie discovered a small room full of computer monitors that were playing security footage from all the cameras in the museum.

Callie closed the door behind them and locked the deadlock. "If they try shooting through the door with their machine guns, we've had it," she observed, swallowing hard.

Iola bit her lip. "We'll just have to hope they don't. Since there's nothing we can do about that anyway, let's concentrate on figuring out how to get out of here and help everybody else get out, too. We can start by figuring out where everybody is."

The girls leaned forward to examine the security feeds. They spotted Frank, Joe, and Illya in a room with two gunmen and a woman, whom they were apparently talking to. They could also see that most of the rest of their friends were locked in a dungeon, until Iola pointed out a group of figures making their way furtively through the hallways.

"Look! It's Chet and Van and Mr. Byron and Kristen. They and some other guy must have gotten away."

"Only partially," Callie reminded her. "They still have to get out of the castle. I wonder if they know where they're headed."

Iola took out her phone. "I'm going to see if I can find the phone number for emergencies."

There was reception here, and Iola was able to connect to the Internet. It only took her a few minutes to find the number she was looking for and dial it. She was greeted by someone speaking in a foreign language.

"I forgot," she groaned before she began explaining the situation as slowly as she could in English.

She was about halfway through when a different woman's voice came over the phone speaking in English. "Hello? Are you speaking English?"

"Yes! Yes, I'm speaking English," Iola said. "I'm inside the…the castle museum. I don't remember what it's called."

"Are you safe?"

"Yeah, I think so," Iola replied. "Those men with the guns don't know my friend and I are here. We're in the security booth."

"With the monitors for the security cameras?"

"That's right."

"Hold on a moment, please. I'll transfer your call so that you can talk to someone at the scene. You may be able to help with rescue efforts."

Soft music began playing as Iola was put on hold. She relayed what was going on to Callie, who nodded. It was good to be doing something to help, and Callie knew perfectly well that she and Iola were in the perfect position to help a lot. Still, she couldn't help looking at the monitor and wishing that she was with Frank right now instead.

"Hey, I have an idea," Iola said while she was still on hold. "I bet the boys would like to know that we're here and can help them out."

"How can we let them know that?" Callie asked.

"We can probably move the cameras from here," Iola said. "If we moved the one in the room that Joe and Frank are in back and forth a little, I bet they'd notice and figure what it meant."

"It's worth a try, anyway," Callie agreed.

HBHBHBHBHB

Frank and Joe were taking their time asking questions. After her argument with Illya, Natalia had refused to say another word, even though she was still obviously frightened. According to Demyan, Illya had evidently advised her against cooperating with the Hardys. The other museum employees, though less unwilling to talk, simply had nothing useful to say, and finally Frank and Joe began questioning non-employees.

One of the first of these was a woman named Sonja Zima. She didn't seem to speak a word of English, and as Illya refused to fulfill his role as interpreter, Demyan was translating the Hardys' questions and Sonja's answers.

"She says she didn't see the Pendant at all since this wing has been closed off for visitors for weeks now," Demyan said, impatience showing in his voice. "For all she knows, it could have been stolen then." He frowned and shook his head. "I don't see what all these questions are accomplishing. The employees might know something, but ordinary tourists wouldn't know any more than you do."

"Most of them, no," Frank admitted, "but our only chance of finding the Pendant within the walls of this castle is if one of these people pretending to be tourists is actually the thief."

"It will take days to learn that," Demyan protested. "The thief won't just admit it when you question him."

"Detective work is slow a lot of the time," Joe told him. "There's not really any way around that. I mean, sometimes you luck out and the solution hits in the face within ten minutes of starting your investigation, but most of the time, it doesn't. As for questioning the suspects, obviously the thief isn't going to just confess. Still, he or she might drop some hint by accident, and at the very least, we're getting faces attached to names. That's very important in investigations."

He glanced at Frank, but they both managed to conceal what they were thinking. Everything Joe had just said was perfectly true. It was just that, usually, they would have started with something less certain to take s incredibly long and saved interviewing this huge number of suspects for more of a last resort. In fact, just from being in the room and making casual observations, Frank and Joe were getting a pretty good idea of what sort of people must have been involved.

The men working on the renovation had obviously come in late that day. That was a little too handy for the thief to be a coincidence. The thief, or perhaps one of the thieves, if there was more than one, must have been someone with the authority to get the workmen to arrive late. That meant a higher-up at the museum or the person in charge of the renovations. Then there was the fact that the case holding the Ruby Pendant had been broken, but the alarm hadn't gone off. That meant someone with access to security or with electronic engineering skills must have been involved. As for the broken case, that was probably just a blind. The case had an electronic key card lock on it, and so the thieves would have either had access to a key card or been able to use their engineering skills to open the lock.

"Anyway," Frank went on, "we really will be here for days if we don't get back to work. Let's get on with it."

Demyan threw his hands in the air. "She doesn't know anything!" He pointed angrily at Sonja. "You're just wasting all our time. I'm beginning to think you lied about being detectives in the first place."

Joe cast a questioning glance at Frank. If they frustrated Demyan too much, he might call off their entire investigation and they would be out of options for stalling for time. Frank glanced back, trying to decide what to do. Then he noticed something over Joe's shoulder. The security camera was directly in his line of sight and was slowly moving back and forth a tiny bit. Perhaps someone – Callie and Iola, maybe? – was trying to get his attention.

Before he could act one way or another, Demyan's phone rang. He answered it, listened for a few moments, and then slammed the phone against the table in fury. He shouted something to his man in their language and then rushed out of the room. The other gunman looked confused, as if he was trying to decide whether to follow or to stay where he was.

"What's going on?" Joe asked.

No one answered. Sonja leaned over and whispered something to Illya. He raised an eyebrow and seemed to hesitate. Then he nodded. He stood up and went to talk to the gunman. He managed to get him to turn his back and while he was distracted, Sonja ran from the room through a different door.

"Uh, should we stop her?" Joe asked Frank.

"Why should we?" Frank looked incredulous. "We're not actually helping Demyan and his guys."

"Well, yeah," Joe agreed. "It's just usually when a suspect runs out while we're questioning them, we usually try to stop them."

"This isn't exactly a normal investigation," Frank reminded him.

Just then, the guard turned around and noticed that Sonja was missing. He gave a cry of alarm and made a move to raise his gun. All at once, Illya kicked the back of his knees and he dropped the gun. Then the two of them began to struggle.

Joe had no sooner seen what was happening than he jumped forward and joined in the struggle. Frank, too, jumped forward, but instead of joining the fight, he gingerly picked up the gun. He had never handled a machine gun before and had no idea how to do so safely, but hopefully once the terrorist saw that he was outnumbered and unarmed, it wouldn't be necessary to do anything with the gun besides hold onto it.

It only took moments for Joe and Illya to subdue their adversary, who lost his mask in the struggle. Joe was surprised to see that the guy didn't look to be any older than Joe was himself. They discovered cords in his pockets and soon had him tied up.

"I thought you two would help once you saw that escape was possible," Illya said, brushing himself off.

"Escape?" Joe repeated. "If anything, we're just in even more trouble now."

"You have friends loose in the castle, do you not?" Illya asked. "You have more friends loose than you think, if they haven't gotten themselves killed by now. The news that caused Demyan to go running out of here was that several of the American prisoners have escaped."

"Great. This is a fine time for those guys to be playing hero," Frank muttered.

"What are we going to do now?" Joe asked. "Try to meet up with them?"

"If we can," Frank replied. "I think I know where the girls are, at least. If I'm right, we can figure it out pretty fast."

HBHBHBHBHB

"Shouldn't we find someplace to hide? They'll find us any second," Kristen protested as she made her way through the hallways of the castle along with the rest of the group who had escaped with her.

"For once, I've got to agree with her," Vanessa said. "Hiding's the only way we're going to stand a chance."

Marius nodded hesitantly without looking at either girl. "All right. If we can find a place where hiding will be an option."

They were just passing through the World War II room where Callie and Iola had hidden in the first place. Chet glanced toward the vent. The grate was on the floor in front of it. The girls were in the castle somewhere, but the vent wouldn't work for any of them to hide in. Even Vanessa and Kristen would be too tall to squeeze into it.

"Hold on a second." Mr. Byron picked up two handheld radio receivers. They were ridiculously large and bulky, but Mr. Byron began checking them to see if they were in working order.

"Won't the batteries in those things be dead?" Kristen asked.

"Maybe not." Mr. Byron turned the switches on and spoke into one. His voice came through the other. "They must have charged the batteries not that long ago. I don't know how much charge there is left, but if we could find a safe place, we might be able to use these to contact outside help. At the very least, if we get separated, we'll be able to keep in touch with each other."

Marius nodded. "I think separating would be a good idea. There will be less chance of us being spotted, and even if we are spotted, at least we won't all risk capture. Perhaps we'd be able to circle around to the secret passage."

"I think we might as well give up on that one," Mr. Byron said. "The girls are right that we should try to find a place to hide."

"I'd be game to try for the secret passage again," Chet spoke up. "If we're just going to hide someplace with a radio that might work to call for help on, we might as well just be back in those dungeons again."

"What if Chet and I go to look for the secret passage, and you and the girls go to hide and try the radio, Mr. Byron?" Marius suggested.

Mr. Byron took in a deep breath and frowned. He didn't like the idea of their group splitting even more than they had already, but neither plan was foolproof and the best chance for all of them was probably to try both. "All right," he agreed finally.

"I'll go with the two of you," Vanessa told Chet and Marius.

"I think it best if as few of us as possible try to reach the secret passage," Marius told her. "Since they already saw us in that area, they may be watching it more closely than any other part of the castle, and we want to be as inconspicuous as possible."

Mr. Byron handed Chet one of the radios and briefly showed him how to work it. Then the two groups split up in different directions.

Mr. Byron and the girls began watching for someplace where they could conceal themselves while they tried to reach the outside world via radio. However, they had barely left the World War II room when they heard footsteps ahead of them. They began a silent retreat the way they had come, but then they heard voices from that direction. They were surrounded.


	6. Chapter 6

J.M.J.

_A/N: Thanks for continuing to read! This chapter is a little short, and it was originally meant to be quite a bit longer, but then I figured that this was a good stopping place. We'll just have to wait until next chapter to see more of the Hardys._

_Thank you to everyone who reviewed the last chapter: max2013, angelicalkiss, EvergreenDreamweaver, Drumboy100, and Cherylann Rivers (funny you should say that about the thief…)! All your reviews are very much appreciated!_

**Chapter VI**

"Everyone stand up!" The sudden, authoritative voice made the boys jump, even though they had been expecting something like this ever since Chet and the others had made their escape.

Jerry and Biff were the only ones who were actually down and they rose slowly. Jim had been leaning against the wall, and now he straightened himself up. Phil and Tony glanced at each other, trying to guess whether the other was thinking the same thing. Perhaps it was years of close association with the Hardys, but they were both trying to think how they might turn this situation to their advantage.

Two gunmen had come into the cell. They were both still wearing their masks, so there was no way for the boys to tell whether they were the same ones the boys had seen earlier or new ones. At any rate, the one who had spoken clearly knew English, and so he might be the same one whom Frank and Joe had made the deal with.

More interesting to Phil was the fact that the men had left the door to the cell open. If he could just figure out a way to keep it from closing properly…

"The prisoners in the cell next to you escaped," the masked man said, his eyes roving over the whole group. "What happened? How did they get out?"

The boys glanced at one another, but none of them made a move to answer.

"Come, come," the man said, using almost a pleasant voice. "I understand you wanting your friends to escape, but surely you can't do them any harm by letting me know how they got out of their cell? After all, the only thing that really matters at this point is that they did get out."

None of the boys answered. Jerry nervously began chewing a piece of gum he had in his mouth. Phil noticed and it sparked an idea in his mind. Now, he had to figure out a way to get in a word with Jerry and then somehow get back to the door without those gunmen noticing. He had to think, but all he could think of was the fact that Frank and Joe would know what to do.

The gunman let out an impatient-sounding breath, but his voice was just as pleasant as it had been before when he resumed speaking. "I'll explain the situation to you. There are limited exits to this building. I have men posted at all of them. Your friends cannot possibly get through, and if they try, they will get hurt. Their attempt at escape is both hopeless and unnecessary. You see, if you cooperate, we do not intend to hurt any of you."

Biff made a sort of snorting sound. "That's not what you were saying earlier."

"When did I say differently?"

"When you were telling our friends, Frank and Joe, that you'd kill all of us unless they helped you find that ruby thing," Biff reminded him. "At least, one of your guys was saying it if it wasn't you."

"Ah, yes." The gunman rubbed his chin through his mask. "That is an unfortunate example. You see, we are all honest men, at least as much so as we can be in this endeavor. There are times, though, when we must sacrifice our ideals and our better selves for the good of our people. We not proud of it, but it is our duty, and so we have no choice."

"What are you even talking about?" Tony shook his head in confusion.

The gunman rephrased his statement. "Sometimes, we must say things that are not necessarily true for the good of our cause."

"Hold on a minute," Tony said. "You're admitting that you're willing to lie for your 'cause', whatever it is? Then how do we know that you're not lying to us now when you say you don't intend to hurt us?"

The masked man chuckled. "Clever. You're a good thinking young man, I see. As such, I have no doubt that can figure out the answer to that on your own. Even so, I suppose I may as well explain it. It's very simple: we wouldn't do something that would not help our cause. Our cause would profit by us lying to your friends and thus persuading them to help us. What would it possibly profit us to harm any of you?"

"Oh, well, when you put it that way, we totally believe everything you have to say," Biff spoke up sarcastically.

During this conversations, Phil had cautiously edged his way to Jerry's side. Luckily, he hadn't had far to go. While the gunmen were distracted by Biff and Tony, Phil whispered to Jerry, "Gum wrapper."

Jerry stared at him, not understanding the request.

"Give me your gum wrapper," Phil whispered again, emphasizing each word slowly and carefully.

Jerry still obviously didn't understand, but he handed over the foil wrapper anyway. Phil wadded it up into a ball and clenched his fist around it. Now he just had to find a way to get close enough to the door. That wasn't going to be easy.

The gunman turned toward Jim. "You have been very quiet through all of this. Perhaps you have something to say now."

Jim hesitated. He would have loved to say something snarky and clever in response, but he couldn't think of anything in the heat of the moment. He simply gave a lop-sided grin and said, "No. I don't think so."

The gunman visibly tensed. "I am growing tired of this. For the sake of your friends, tell me what you know."

"Yeah, that's not gonna happen," Biff said. "You might want to try a different tactic, like 'good cop, bad cop' or something like that. Of course, that's not gonna do a lot of good when we already know that one, but it'd be better than your current techniques."

The gunman took a menacing step toward Biff. His companion gave him a warning to their language, while the other boys all tensed. All except for Phil. Phil saw his chance, and while everyone was distracted, edged his way to the door and shoved the gum wrapper into the jamb. If it stayed and if it was thick enough, their captors wouldn't be able to lock them in again.

HBHBHBHBHB

Callie and Iola kept their eyes fixed on the monitors in front of them. There was so much to try to watch at once. Iola was trying to keep the police and military who had gathered outside the museum up to date on what was happening via cell phone, but it wasn't easy. Things were constantly changing, and Iola didn't know the layout of the building well enough to keep track of where everyone was going.

Callie helped her as much as she was able, but her eyes kept straying to whichever screen was showing Frank at the moment. He and Joe were on the move now, along with Illya Láska. Callie was terrified that they would run into danger and she would have to watch without being able to do anything.

Suddenly, someone knocked on the door. Iola jumped with something between a yip and a squeak. Callie sat frozen with wide eyes. Neither one of them even thought to look at the screen showing the hallway outside the security booth to try to determine who their visitor was.

"Hey, it's all right. It's not one of those men," a soft female voice called through the door.

Callie and Iola looked at one another. Iola lowered the phone from her ear. Whoever was on the other end of the line couldn't make this decision for them.

"I don't think any of them were women," Iola whispered.

"The way they were dressed and with the masks and everything, how can you tell?" Callie countered.

There was another knock. "Please. Frank and Joe Hardy sent me. I managed to get away from those men."

"There was a woman who got away just before Frank and Joe did," Iola said. "She could be telling the truth."

Callie nodded slowly. "Okay. You stand right next to the door, though, just in case she brought some friends with her."

Once Iola was in position, Callie pushed the door open. The woman standing on the other side of it hardly looked threatening. She glanced furtively over her shoulder and then darted into the room.

"Thank goodness," she said, sinking into Iola's chair. "I thought I'd never find this place. You don't know how relieved I am."

"We can imagine," Callie said, thinking back to just a few hours earlier when she and Iola had been in much the same position.

"You said Frank and Joe sent you?" Iola asked. "How? They couldn't have known where we were until just before you escaped, and I know they didn't tell you then. We were watching the whole thing."

"Well, it's not like we had a lot of time to figure out our plan," the woman told them. "You couldn't hear us, right? Frank and Joe figured you'd come here. I just needed to come so we could get in touch with you. I'm Sonja, by the way. You must be Callie and Iola."

The girls looked at one another again. There was something they didn't like about Sonja, but Frank and Joe would have never told her about them if she was in league with the terrorists.

Sonja noticed Iola's phone on the desk and picked it up. "You have a call in to the police. Smart. No wonder the Hardy Boys like you." She disconnected the call.

Iola reached out to take her phone back, but Sonja withheld it. "What did you do that for?"

"Sorry, but the police aren't my favorite people in the world to talk to, and if they're the ones who get us out of here, then they'll just put me in a different prison."

Callie put her hands behind her back, wondering if she would be able to pull her phone out of her back pocket without Sonja noticing. She decided she couldn't. Even if she could, she wouldn't be able to dial it before Sonja could stop her.

"Wait, so you _are_ in league with these people?" Iola asked.

"No way," Sonja replied. "Believe me, I was just as upset as you were when those losers showed up. Probably even more. You have no idea how long I'd been planning this, and then to have something like this happen. I really do have the worst luck. Nope. I am very not in league with them."

"You're not Laurenian, are you?" Callie asked.

"How'd ya guess?" Sonja smirked. "Actually, I am, though. Born here, anyway. Grew up in the States. Got in a lot of trouble in the States, too. Then I met some people and things started happening, and next thing I know, I'm on my way back to the old country to steal one of its national treasures. Crazy how life goes sometimes, huh?" Neither girl responded, so she went on, "Anyhow, I've been thinking the last few hours that even if these idiots don't actually kill me, my life is still pretty much over. Even if I got away now, how could I possibly keep this day from being a total wash-out? Then they gave me an idea for how to get it back on track, and you two can help me."

She leaned over and pulled a long stiletto out of one of her high boots.


	7. Chapter 7

J.M.J.

_A/N: Thank you for continuing to read! Thank you especially to everyone who has left reviews since I posted the last chapter: EvergreenDreamweaver, Drumboy100, max2013, Candylou, angelicalkiss, Cherylann Rivers, and ErinJordan! Your feedback and support is very much appreciated!_

**Chapter VII**

"Should we tie him up and just make a break for it?" Joe asked, looking down at the gunman sitting on the floor in front of him.

"If we want to enjoy our newfound freedom for only a few minutes, after which I and possibly you will meet our immediate and painful end, yes," Illya said.

"Then what should we do?" Frank couldn't keep annoyance out of his voice. "You know, if it had been up to us, we wouldn't have tried to escape in the first place. Now you've only gotten us all in even more danger."

"Only if we're caught," Illya reminded him. "We'll tie this one up securely and hide him, but not before we take his clothes and mask. I'll put these on and carry the gun. That way, we may be able to get past any of his compatriots we come across."

"Why can't one of us wear his clothes?" Joe asked.

"These people aren't so stupid that they would be fooled by someone who can't even speak out language," Illya replied.

"Fair point," Joe admitted begrudgingly.

"We'd better hurry," Frank said.

While Illya was putting on the disguise over his suit, Frank and Joe bound the prisoner hand and foot. Then they locked him in the nearest storage closet.

"Where should we go?" Joe asked. "It's not like we have a way out or a plan or anything like that."

"Okay, maybe not," Frank said, whose logic was beginning to outweigh his frustration with Illya, "but that doesn't really matter now. We need to move on from where we're at, not where we wish we were."

"Exactly," Illya agreed. "Our first order of business should be to find the Pendant."

"Hold on a second there," Frank said. "Our first order of business is to either help the police get inside or help the hostages get out. Unless you've changed your tune and you'd let us exchange the Pendant for the lives of everyone in the museum."

"I can't do that," Illya told him. "I can't do that any more than you could surrender your Declaration of Independence to such people."

Joe rolled his eyes. "You know, even if this was _National Treasure_ gone wrong and an evil Nicholas Cage was holding everybody hostage in the Smithsonian unless we handed over the Declaration of Independence…"

Illya's look of utter confusion persuaded Frank to interrupt his brother. "I can completely understand you wanting to protect one of your national treasures. I really do. But we're talking about people's lives here. That has to take first priority."

Illya gave a sort of shrug. "Human lives are only temporary, anyway. For all we know, any of these hostages could die in some other way next week. But the Ruby Pendant is irreplaceable."

"And that's why your country has problems like this right there," Joe said. Illya's attitude was beginning to make him fume even more.

Illya sighed and gave a slight shake of his head, but he didn't seem in the least convinced.

"It doesn't really make any difference, anyway," Frank said in an attempt to keep the peace. No matter how much they dislike Illya at the moment, they still had to work with him. "We don't have any leads to the Pendant anyway. Getting everybody out safely is maybe more than we can do as it is, but there's nothing we can do at all about the Pendant."

"Except I know who stole it," Illya said.

"You do? Who? How could you know that?" Frank asked.

"It was the woman whom you were talking with when the excitement started," Illya explained.

"Sonja whatever-her-last-name-was?" Joe asked. "And you let her go? But I thought…That doesn't make any sense with your whole 'the Pendant is more important that everyone' mantra."

"It's very simple," Illya told him. "My priority is to keep the Pendant safe. It's safer with Sonja than with those lunatics. If I didn't help her escape, they might get their hands on it. They can't now. However, if we can track down Sonja before she leaves the museum, we could recover the Pendant ourselves."

Frank rubbed his temple. "We still need to focus on getting the people out safely, but since we don't have any ideas on that yet…I guess if we meet up with the girls in the security booth – if we can find it – we could figure out where Sonja is pretty quick."

"I think I know where it is," Illya said. "Come with me."

They hurried down one hallway, and then turned down another. As they made a third turn, they saw three figures ahead of them: Vanessa, Kristen, and Mr. Byron.

Kristen let out a long, loud scream when she saw them. Vanessa and Mr. Byron wavered from one foot to the other as they tried to decide whether to stand their ground or run.

Frank glanced at Illya, who was indistinguishable from the gunmen in his mask. "It's okay. It's just us. This is just Mr. Láska."

Vanessa heaved a sigh of relief. "I thought we were all done for for a second there."

"We may still be if those terrorists heard her screaming." Illya nodded toward Kristen.

Kristen's cheeks reddened. "I'm sorry."

"We'd better go," Frank said.

The six of them started down the hallway once again, dreading the appearance of one or more of their captors at any moment. They hadn't gotten far when they were startled by Illya's phone ringing.

"I believe it's an American number," he reported as he looked at the screen.

Joe looked over his shoulder. "That's Iola's number. But how would she know yours, unless…" He swallowed hard instead of finishing the sentence. The thought of the girls being captured was too much.

Illya answered the phone with a curt "Hello."

"Hello, there," a female voice replied. "This is Sonja. I know you remember me. We just talked a few minutes ago. Sorry for pretending I couldn't speak English back there. I think it would be best if we keep on speaking English now, though. Also, you should put your phone on speaker. I know the Hardys and their little school friends you just met up with will want to hear what I'm saying."

Wordlessly, Illya took the phone from his ear and pressed the speaker button. Sonja's voice came through clearly.

"I'm prepared to offer y'all a deal," she went on. "See, I'm not out of thw oods on this whole problem just yet and I think we can help each other. Before those goons grabbed me, I stashed the Ruby Pendant so they couldn't take it from me. You find it and return it to me, and I'll not slit the throats of these two charming American teenagers. Everybody happy."

There was a tense pause as the impact of these words sank in for everyone.

"We need proof that you haven't hurt the girls already." Frank made an effort to speak calmly despite his hammering heart.

"Fair enough." Sonja's voice sounded almost careless.

A moment later, Iola's voice came over the phone. "Joe? Frank? Can you hear me?"

"Are you okay?" Joe asked.

"Yes," Iola replied. "She hasn't hurt either me or Callie."

There was a pause as Sonja took the phone back. "Yet. I haven't hurt them yet. Here's how this is gonna work. I can see just about every move you make. I'll tell you where to go and where to look and how to avoid the bad guys. You get your friends back when I get my super valuable necklace back. Deal?"

"We can't…" Illya started to say but Joe cut him off. "Deal."

"We're not in any position to make any such deal," Illya told him, switching the speaker phone off so that Sonja wouldn't be able to hear him. "If and when we recover the Pendant, we will be obliged to return it to the government."

"But I'm sure youre government would much rather see two American citizens returned unharmed than risk an international incident," Mr. Byron pointed out. "Even if it does mean putting the Pendant at risk."

Illya sighed, but he had to admit that the teacher was right. He turned speaker phone back on and said, "Very well."

"Now that that's settled, let's get to work, shall we?" Sonja replied. "The first thing you should do is contact your other two escaped friends and loop them in on what's happening so we can help them keep from being recaptured, even though I don't have to help them. See? I'm a nice girl."

"Who is she talking about?" Joe asked.

"Chet and Marius, I guess," Vanessa told him.

"Who's Marius?" Joe asked.

"He helped us break out," Vanessa explained. "He said he's a contractor who's been working on the restoration program. He knew about a secret passageway that leads out of the castle and that we were trying to get to. He and Chet are still trying to find it."

"A contractor," Frank repeated. "That's interesting."

"How so?" Illya asked.

"It's just very convenient that he would know a way out of the castle." Frank didn't want to say what he was thinking in front of everyone; it would be much better to discuss it with just Joe. To divert the conversation, he nodded at the old-fashioned walkie-talkie in Mr. Byron's hand. "Does that thing actually work?"

"I believe so," Mr. Byron said. "Chet and Marius have the other one, so we should be able to contact them over it."

He spoke over the radio and after a few tense moments, Chet's voice came back in reply. "What's going on, Mr. Byron?"

Mr. Byron explained the situation, including the predicament that Callie and Iola were currently in. His story was met with momentary silence. Then Marius's voice replied, "Even if you return the Pendant to that woman, she will not release your friends."

"How can you be so sure?" Mr. Byron asked.

"Well, she is a thief, is she not?" Marius replied. "She is most certainly not worthy of trust."

Frank asked Mr. Byron if he might take the radio. Knowing that the Hardys had more experience in this arena than he did, Mr. Byron handed the walkie-talkie over.

"Marius?" Frank said into the radio. "My name is Frank Hardy. I'm an amateur detective, and I've dealt with situations like this before. You could be right that Sonja won't release the girls even if we carry through our end of the bargain. However, because she's a burglar rather than an armed robber, she might be content to make an exchange."

"She is not," Marius said simply. "You must believe me on that point."

Frank caught Joe's eye, and Joe nodded slightly to him. Marius's certainty on this was a little strange.

"How do you know?" Frank asked.

"I…just do," Marius said.

Frank paused for a moment, but then he decided that he could find out whether Marius actually knew what he was talking about or not later. For now, there were more urgent things to worry about. "Okay. You could be right, and believe me, I want to play this as safely as possible. But we're short on options. Our best chance is to play along for now."

"Very well," Marius agreed reluctantly. "You say she will help us not to get captured, at least as long as it's useful to her?"

"Right," Frank said.

"You done talking yet?" Sonja broke into the conversation. "The biggest drawback of speaker phone is that it is kind of hard to hear what people are saying if they don't talk slow enough. Anyhow, now that you've contacted your buddies and had enough time to tell them what's going on, you'd better tell them to get moving. There's some bad guys headed straight for them. The rest of you might want to start going, too, before I start feeling impatient."


	8. Chapter 8

J.M.J.

_A/N: Thank you so much for continuing to read! Thank you especially to everyone who has left reviews since I posted the last chapter: Candylou, ErinJordan, EvergreenDreamweaver, angelicalkiss, Drumboy100, max2013, BMSH, and Cherylann Rivers. Wow! There's a lot of you! That is awesome! Thank you guys so much!_

**Chapter VIII**

"Make the next right turn you come to," Sonja was saying over Illya's cell phone. He had turned the volume of the speaker phone down for fear it would be overheard, but since everyone in the group was moving in complete silence – even Kristen – they could all hear what she was saying plainly. "Whoops!" she went on. "There's a bad guy there. Better hide."

Joe rolled his eyes. "She's really enjoying herself, isn't she?"

"A lot more than we are," Vanessa whispered back in a wry attempt at humor.

"Better keep it down," Mr. Byron warned them. "There's no sense helping those men find us."

"I'm sure Vanessa wouldn't do anything wrong or stupid," Kristen muttered under her breath, but this time, she managed to speak softly enough that only Frank overheard it.

He took note of what she said, but since there were more urgent things to worry about just now than a spat between the girls, he went straight back to his contemplations about the case.

When Marius had warned them over the radio that Sonja meant to double cross them, he hadn't given any reason other than that Sonja was a thief and was therefore untrustworthy by definition. Frank was certain that Marius must know something more definite than that, and he suspected that Marius had had something to do with the theft of the Ruby Pendant. Frank was keeping quiet about it, though. If he was wrong, there was no point in stirring up the others' distrust for Marius, and if he was right, there was no point in tipping Marius off that he was onto him.

Frank had to admit, though, that he agreed with Marius in being unwilling to trust Sonja, even after the group had decided that cooperating with her was the best choice. So far, she had been true to her word and had helped them to avoid the "bad guys", as she insisted on calling them, from her vantage point in front of the security monitors. Thanks to her help, Chet and Marius had been able to safely reach the area where the secret passage was supposed to be, and Frank, Joe, and the others were approaching the place where she had hidden the Ruby Pendant.

"Better pick up your pace," Sonja adveised them over the phone once the group of masked men had gone past. "There are a whole bunch more on your six o'clock."

"We're going as quickly as we think is advisable," Illya told her, his tone testy. "Where exactly did you hide the Pendant?"

"I'll let you know in a minute or two," Sonja said. "You're almost there."

Sure enough, in another couple of minutes, they had arrived in a small room full of trunks and boxes that were evidently used for storage. Sonja instructed them to look in a cardboard box that had two other boxes piled on top of it. In his eagerness, Illya tossed the other boxes to the side and then looked into the one in question. He breathed a long sigh.

"It's here." He picked it up almost reverently and the others crowded around to look at the object which had caused them all so much trouble.

"Just remember there, Mr. Illya Láska," Sonja told him. "That shiny necklace is mine. You don't get to keep it."

Illya seemed to be about to make a retort, but Frank cast him a warning glance, and he bit his tongue.

"Now," Sonja went on, "it looks like your buddies are having a hard time looking for that secret passage. You'd better go help them look. Once they find it, we'll talk about me going to meet up with you. See, you're going to have to…" She broke off with a sudden curse and the line went dead.

"Sonja?" Illya said. "Sonja? Are you still there?"

"Obviously not," Joe told him. "What could have happened?"

Frank ran his hand through his hair in exasperation. "Do you really have to ask that? It looks like we are in even deeper trouble now than we were before. At least, now we have a bargaining chip."

Illya shook his head. "No, we don't. I'm not surrendering the Pendant for anything or to anyone."

"It might be the only way to save anyone's life," Frank reminded him. "You can't just make the decision that a piece of metal and stone is more valuable than other people's lives, no matter how valuable or irreplaceable it is. If you would rather die than give it up, that's your choice, but you can't force other people into something like that."

Illya set his mouth. "I cannot and will not allow the Pendant out of my sight now that I have recovered it."

"You can't do that," Joe protested. "That pendant is the only advantage we have. Besides, if they kill us all, they'll get it anyway."

"You clearly don't understand the significance," Illya argued. "Perhaps in America, you can afford to place so little value on the emblems of your country…"

"We're not saying that the Pendant is worthless," Frank told him. "Obviously, it's worth a great. It's just that you can't really compare it to people's lives."

Illya was still unconvinced. Even though Mr. Byron and the girls added their arguments, he refused to budge on this point. The Americans finally had to admit defeat, and to add to the desperate situation, they no longer seemed to have a guide who could lead them to safety away from this room.

HBHBHBHBHB

"Marius." Chet had been running his hand along a bookshelf in the room where the secret passage was supposed to be when he suddenly paused. It seemed like Frank and Joe were always finding secret passages behind bookshelves, and so when Chet saw that this room contained a bookshelf, the first thing he had done was to start searching it. It had taken him a while, but finally when he had run his finger across a bump in the wood he had discovered, he distinctly heard a click. He told this to Marius.

"What did you press?" Marius asked. He craned his neck to see the place.

Chet still had his finger on the spot. "Right here."

"Move your finger so I can see," Marius requested.

The bookshelves were made of smooth, polished oak. In this one spot, there was an almost imperceptible bump in the wood underneath one of the shelves. At first glance, it would seem to be merely a slight flaw in the planning of the wood. However, now that Chet and Marius looked more closely at it, they could see that it was actually a separate piece of wood that had been fitted into a knothole and then filed down so that it looked as if it was one piece with the rest of the shelf.

"This has to be the catch," Marius said, "but you say nothing happened when you pressed it?"

"There was a click, but that was all," Chet told him. "Maybe if we pressed it harder?" He suited the action to the words, and once again, there was a click but nothing seemed to change.

"Perhaps the catch is here, but the door itself is somewhere else," Marius suggested. "Since you pressed the catch, it should be open now. We must look for it."

They turned their attention to the rest of the room. Finally, Chet spotted an area of the floor that had dropped a fraction of an inch. After some pushing and pulling, he and Marius managed to raise it to reveal a space underneath that led into a passage.

"Is this it?" Chet asked. "It's smaller than I thought it would be."

"Secret passages need to be small, or else they are too easy to discover," Marius told him.

"Yeah." Chet looked down at it. "Why's it here, though?"

Marius shrugged. "Why would I know?"

"I don't know." Chet scratched his head. "Was it original with the castle?"

"Again, I don't know," Marius replied. "What difference does it make?"

"None, I guess," Chet said. He really didn't think the question insignificant. After all, it now occurred to him that if this was meant to be a secret passage, why would it have been on the blueprints for anyone to see? Was it possible that Marius was lying about how he had learned about the passage? Still, maybe now wasn't the time to worry about that. "We'd better radio the others and tell them we found it."

"I suppose," Marius said. "You go ahead, but I can't go with you?"

"Why not?" Chet stared at him.

"I have someone still in the building," Marius explained. "I have to go back for her."

Chet sighed. "Go back?"

"You don't have to," Marius assured him. "Get out with your friends. Show the authorities the secret passage. They can use it to get in the building and begin a rescue."

"You're not going to be able to get out of here," Chet warned him.

"I'll take my chances," Marius replied. "There's no sense standing here and arguing about it." He didn't give Chet a chance to protest any further and rushed out of the room.

A little at a loss for what to do, Chet pressed the button on the walkie-talkie and called Frank and Joe and the others. "We found the secret passage," he reported. "Except now Marius took off and says he needs to find somebody and I don't know what to do about it."

"Okay," Frank replied and then sighed. "We can't worry too much about that, though. It's not our only problem at the moment…"

HBHBHBHBHB

Callie looked over at Iola. Both girls were seated in wheeled computer chairs while Sonja was sitting on the desk with one eye on her prisoners and the other on the computer screens showing the security footage. She had taken Iola's cell phone to call Illya, whose number she had gotten through an internet search. Callie, however, still had her phone in her back pocket and had pulled her shirt down over it to hide it. Fortunately, Sonja hadn't thought to search her. Now she just had to wait for an opportunity to use it without Sonja noticing.

Of course, even if she did get an opportunity like that, it wouldn't immediately solve their problems. It would be even better if she and Iola could engineer an escape on their own.

She tried to determine whether Iola was thinking the same thing, but she couldn't tell from the expression on her friend's face. Iola was staring at the monitors, probably alternating between watching Joe and watching Chet. Callie couldn't whisper to her without Sonja noticing, so making escape plans was out of the question for now.

Even if Iola's eyes were on the screens, her mind really was in a similar place to Callie, just a little closer to how Joe probably would have been viewing the situation. Sonja didn't have a gun, just a knife. She also wasn't being particularly threatening with it Iola and Callie could probably jump her and isarm her.

Iola was weighing the probability of this plan ending with either her or Callie getting stabbed when something on the computer screen caused her to gasp. Sonja turned to look and broke off whatever she was saying over the phone with a curse. The screen clearly showed three gunmen approaching the security booth.

Sonja promptly disconnected the call and went to the door to double check that it was locked. Then she turned to the girls. "There's about a seventy-five percent chance that we're about to die a sudden and terrible death, so if either of you are religious, right now would be a good time to start praying."

"Doesn't that bother you?" Iola asked, surprised at how carelessly Sonja made this announcement.

"No, praying doesn't bother me," Sonja replied. "I don't really do it myself, but whatever floats your boat."

"That's not what I…" Iola began to protest.

Sonja interrupted her. "Since our twenty-five percent chance of survival involves all of us hitting the deck, I suggest we do that right now."

She instantly threw herself on the floor, and Callie and Iola followed suit. Someone rattled at the door handle, but of course it didn't open. Then, with a suddenness that made both girls scream in surprise, there was a volley of machine gun fire and bullets ripped through the door.


	9. Chapter 9

J.M.J.

_A/N: Thank you so much for continuing to read! Thank you especially to Candylou, Drumboy100, ErinJordan, max2013, BMSH, EvergreenDreamweaver, angelicalkiss, and Cherylann Rivers for your reviews since I posted the last chapter! This chapter is a sort of "calm before the storm" type of chapter before the climax starts, so we're almost to the end._

**Chapter IX**

The door to the security booth was kicked open with a resounding crash. The three gunmen roughly grabbed Callie, Iola, and Sonja and dragged them all to their feet. They asked several angry questions in their language, but the women merely shrugged, as neither Callie or Iola could understand and Sonja was pretending not to.

One of the men spotted Iola's cell phone on the ground and picked it up. He then tucked it into his own pocket. Then he gave an order to his men, and by pointing they managed to make their prisoners know that they wanted them to leave the room.

Even in this dire situation, Sonja glanced at the remains of the security screens and smirked. "These morons sure did a job on the screens. There's no way to watch the security footage now." She winked at the two girls.

Callie ran her fingers through her hair with an exasperated sigh. Everything about this situation just kept getting worse and worse, and the weirdest part about it was that nobody seemed to care. They were being held hostage by masked men who could kill them at any moment. Everyone should be freaking out, not just making wisecracks and calm observations.

The gunmen marched their prisoners down to the dungeon. Once they were there, they bypassed the first cell – which the girls knew had held Chet and the others – and instead put them in the next cell, with Phil, Tony, and the rest. The boys started guiltily when the cell door was opened, as if they had been up to something, but they did a good job of covering up their surprise after that.

"Are you guys all right?" Biff asked as the girls were shoved into the cell.

"We're okay," Iola assured him.

As soon as the door had slammed shut behind them and the masked men had moved onward, Phil jumped forward to examine the door. He breathed a sigh of relief as he pushed it open a few inches.

"Oh, splendid," Sonja said. "You boys have an escape plan."

"Who is this?" Phil asked, looking toward Callie and Iola.

"She's a thief who stole some kind of necklace?" Iola tried to explain. "I don't really know. She threatened to kill us, but I don't think she's in with those gunmen."

"We don't know that," Callie interjected. "I think she might be. She's pretty calm about being captured by them. How about it, Sonja? Are you one of them?"

Sonja rolled her eyes. "I would have thought a girl dating one of the Hardy Boys would be smarter than all of that. Do I _look_ like a half-crazed revolutionary who would be stupid enough to get herself boxed in by both the police and the army? I did think that you had a better opinion of me than that."

"You didn't answer the question," Callie replied, although the flush in her cheeks betrayed that Sonja's reply had flustered her.

"Hold on," Tony said. "That's not as interesting as what she did say. Did you tell her that you're dating Frank, Callie?"

"Why would have I told her that?" Callie retorted.

"Then how did you know?" Tony turned toward Sonja. "And why do you call Frank and Joe 'the Hardy Boys', like the papers do?"

"Probably because that's what the papers call them?" Sarcasm was the most distinctive feature in Sonja's tone. Then she smirked. "Finally! Someone who actually acts like they have a brain. It's about time. I'm getting really tired of being surrounded by morons. Nothing personal, girls; I'm just saying things how they are."

Phil shook his head. "Wow. Well, talking to this person is a waste of time. You say she's the one who stole the Ruby Pendant? Where is it? If we knew where it was, then we might be able to swing a deal with these people."

"Or they might decide they don't need us anymore and shoot us," Jerry pointed out.

"Frank and Joe have the Pendant," Iola said. "They're with Mr. Byron and Vanessa and Kristen. That's the last thing we saw before those guys busted into the security booth and started shooting the place up."

"They also wrecked the surveillance system while they were at it," Sonja added. "We can go anywhere we want in the castle without having to worry about them watching. Thank you very much."

"Then let's get out of here," Biff urged the others. "We've been talking it over, and we think we know a way out."

"Please not the sewers." Sonja made a face. "I already had to tell Marius a very definite no on that one."

"Marius?" Iola repeated. "Isn't he the one with Chet? He's your partner?"

Sonja made an even more expressive face and pretended to gag. "Mercy, no. I'd rather you thought I was in with the revolutionaries. At least they have the guts to carry out a plan, even if it is an incredibly stupid plan, which, in a way, takes more guts than carrying out an intelligent plan, I guess. More guts, but less brains. Anyway, I am absolutely, positively, one-hundred-percently, _not_ partners with Marius. The only dealings I've had or want to have with him is when I persuaded him to serve in an advisory position." She chuckled. "Poor Marius. When he finds out how the Fates have tricked him, his poor wittle heart will break."

The Bayporters gave Sonja one last disgusted look and then by silent consensus began to ignore her completely. She acted as if she was completely insane, and so nothing she told them was even necessarily true.

"What is your plan?" Callie asked the boys.

"As you can see, we can get out of the cell," Phil explained. "The gunmen only seem to come through that one door. We can barricade it with the benches and table from the 'guard area' next to it. There's a door on the other end of the hallway, but we haven't seen them come through it even once. We're want to try going through it. It's not much of a plan, but there's not a whole lot we can do when we don't even have a map of the castle."

"I do." Sonja pulled a folded up piece of paper from her pocket and presented it to Phil. "Don't say I never gave you anything."

Phil unfolded the paper, which turned out to be one of the maps that were available for free for tourists. "Oh, gee, thanks. This will really help."

"Can we tie her up and gag her?" Biff asked. "She's quickly getting to the point that even her breathing is annoying."

"Well, just imagine how I must feel, surrounded by people like you," Sonja retorted.

"I second the motion," Jim spoke up. "Anybody have anything we can use?"

HBHBHBHBHB

Joe paced back and forth. He hated being stuck in this room, but Illya refused to leave without a guide to lead them through safely. He insisted that it wouldn't be long before the authorities figured out how to get inside, and the best thing they could do was stay put. Mr. Byron agreed, and that, apparently, was that.

Vanessa was sitting on one of the trunks with her arms wrapped around her knees. She gave him a sympathetic smile, and so Joe sat down next to her.

"So, are all your school trips at Bayport High this exciting?" Vanessa asked.

Joe chuckled wryly. "Hardly. How about at your old school?"

Vanessa shook her head. "I didn't even know that people could have this much excitement in real life. I'd like it a lot better if I knew we were going to get out of it alive. Tell me the truth, Joe. Do we have a very good chance?"

"I don't know." Joe looked away for a few seconds. "To be honest, I don't even want to make a guess at this point. With a little luck, maybe some divine intervention. Of course, one of the keys to surviving a situation like this is making up your mind that you're going to survive it."

"Does that really work?" Vanessa asked.

"Well, I haven't died yet, so I'd say it has so far." Joe tried to give her a smile. "Do you think Iola and Callie are okay?"

Vanessa tucked a lock of ash-blonde hair behind her ear. "I hope so. I just wonder what happened."

"_That's_ not too hard to guess," Joe replied. "They probably got recaptured. At least, I hope that's what happened. Sonja seems like she's a few fries short of a Happy Meal. I hope she didn't try anything stupid."

For a few moments, Vanessa didn't reply. Finally, she asked, "How do you do it, Joe? How do you stay so calm in a situation like this? I just feel like crying or something dumb like that. It's so embarrassing."

"It's nothing to be embarrassed about," Joe assured her. "You just have to think about other people instead of yourself. Just imagine that everyone else needs you to be a pillar of strength for them and it's a lot easier than trying to be strong for yourself."

"You mean like how the best way to cheer yourself up is to try to cheer somebody else up?" Vanessa asked.

"Yeah, something like that," Joe agreed.

"I think I could do that," Vanessa said, "but it still doesn't get us out of here."

Joe sighed. "Even if we could get out, everyone else will still be inside. Really, the only way that that would help too much is…" He paused. "…if we could tell the authorities how to get in."

"Wait. We can do that already," Vanessa said. "Chet knows where the secret passageway is and…For that matter, he can just go out through it. What's he waiting for?"

"I don't know, but I intend to find out." Joe jumped to his feet. "Frank, we'd better call Chet again and see what his hold-up is."

While Joe and Vanessa had been talking, Frank had noticed Kristen watching them with a distraught expression. He didn't know Kristen very well, but he did know that she had some kind of grudge against Vanessa. Perhaps it was time to find out what it was. If they were going to have to do anything more than just wait around to be rescued – and he had a feeling that they would have to do more than that – he needed to know that everybody was on the same team. Or at least, everyone besides Illya, who seemed to be a lost cause at this point.

He handed the radio to Joe, who immediately began trying to call Chet, and then went to talk to Kristen. "Hey, how are you doing?"

Kristen wiped away a tear. "Fine, I guess. How should I be?"

"I don't know," Frank replied. "But it's okay if you're scared."

"I doubt that," Kristen said, trying to hold her head up.

"We're all scared," Frank reassured her. "It's pretty normal in a situation like this."

"Yeah, well, whatever." Kristen turned away from him. "Save it for Vanessa. She's the one whose delicate feelings need watched out for at every turn."

"Okay, what's the deal between you and Vanessa?" Frank asked. "I normally wouldn't ask, and definitely not so bluntly, but we're probably going to need to all work together to get out of this and we're going to need to get along to do that. What's going on between you and Van?"

"That," Kristen said. "That right there."

"What?" Frank asked.

Kristen sighed. "Oh, it's stupid. And it doesn't matter right now anyway. The only thing that matters is that I'm not like all of you. I'm scared stiff and I talk too loud at the wrong moments, and I just want to get out of here or find out that this whole thing is just a bad dream or something. In other words, I'm completely useless."

"You mean, in other words, you're completely normal," Frank said. "Those are completely normal reactions to something like this."

"Then normal people must be completely useless," Kristen replied.

"No," Frank corrected her again. "Most people can go their whole lives without ever getting into a situation like this or having to prepare for one, but when something like this does happen to them, most people are able to rise to the occasion and do what it takes to get out of it. That's a lot more impressive than just doing something that you've been preparing to do."

"It still doesn't apply to me." Kristen turned and walked away to indicate that the conversation was over.

"We've got more problems, Frank," Joe said, still holding the walkie-talkie. "Chet's not answering. Something must have happened to him."


	10. Chapter 10

J.M.J.

_A/N: Thank you so much for continuing to read! Thank you especially to Candylou, ErinJordan, Drumboy100, max2013, EvergreenDreamweaver, angelicalkiss, and Cherylann Rivers for your reviews on the last chapter! There will be two more chapters after this one._

**Chapter X**

Chet stared down into the passageway. It was dark and narrow, and he was beginning to feel that he would really rather not go down in it by himself without even so much as a flashlight. For all he knew, Marius could have been lying about the passage leading outside. It could be a trap, either leading straight back to the masked revolutionaries or into an impenetrable maze or to a giant pit. He couldn't see any reason for Marius to try to kill him, but there was also no apparent reason for him to run off the way he had. He hadn't said anything before that about anyone whom he had to go back for. Why would have he left this person in the first place?

Chet knew he was just being paranoid because he was alone. If there was only Frank or Joe or Iola or Biff or Jerry was with him, then he wouldn't be nearly as nervous about going down in here. Still, what else was he going to do? He might as well have stayed back in that dungeon if he wasn't going to go down into the tunnel now. He took a deep breath, straightened his shoulders, and started down.

He wasn't a moment too soon, but he was nearly a moment too late. He had only just pulled the trapdoor back down before he heard footsteps come into the room. Opening the trapdoor a crack, he peered out. The soles of several pairs of heavy, black boots were visible, and the sound of male voices was clearly audible. They were speaking in the Laurenian language, but, oddly enough, Chet caught three definitely English words: "the four winds".

Then he closed the trapdoor and plunged himself into total darkness. His heart hammered, and he was afraid to even move lest he step into a hole. He was out of choices now, though. The only thing he could even do now was to try to find his way out of the tunnel. He took a few tentative steps forward and found the floor smooth and even and solid.

Just as Chet was beginning to relax a little, the walkie-talkie in his hand crackled. His eyes bulged and he frantically tried to turn it off as Joe's voice came over it. Even in the dark, he found the switch and turned it off. Then he waited, listening for the sound of the trapdoor opening.

A minute passed. Then another. It sounded like the conversation from the room above had grown more excited, but there was no sign of pursuit. Chet breathed a little easier as he remembered how difficult it had been for him and Marius to find the trapdoor and the catch that opened it. Chances were good that these masked men wouldn't be able to do the same, at least not very quickly. By the time they found it, if they found it, Chet could be well on his way out of here. He just needed to figure out where to go.

He stretched out one of his hands and soon found a wall. He wasn't sure which way to follow the wall, but he figured that if he took the wrong direction, he'd figure it out pretty quickly when he ran into another wall or something. He made his choice and started forward.

After a few minutes, he came to a dead end. Even though he felt around over the wall he had run into, he could not find any sign that the tunnel went farther in this direction. Confident now that he knew which way to go, he turned around and began feeling his way in the opposite direction. However, he had scarcely been walking for ten minutes before he ran into another wall. This one, too, seemed to be a dead end.

Chet sank down to the stone floor. Marius had led him to a trap after all.

HBHBHBHBHB

"Do you think this is good enough?" Biff asked as he placed the last piece of furniture he and his friends could find in front of the door to the cell block.

"It won't stop machine guns if they decide to try shooting this door down like they did with the security booth," Jim said. "It might hold them out for a little while, though, if they don't use their guns."

Phil shook his head. "That's not good enough. We can't get everybody out of their cells, so we have to make sure they're not going to get hurt when we leave."

"Let's look at that map again that Sonja gave us," Tony suggested.

Jerry had been holding onto it, and he now flattened it out so that they could all examine it. It wasn't overly detailed and certainly didn't show any secret passages or any other parts of the castle that were not open to tourists, but it did give the general layout of the castle, as well as all the exits.

"It's not much good," Jerry complained. "There's only the one main exit and then several emergency exits. They're all bound to be guarded, and even if they weren't, an alarm will go off if you open one and who knows what would happen then."

"True," Tony agreed, "but what about a window? This is a castle, after all, and some of the windows are pretty big. Could we climb out through one of them?"

"If we can find a window that opens, possibly," Phil said. "That's not something we can count on."

"You know, Sonja's a real psycho, but even she couldn't be crazy enough to try something like this without a backup plan to get out," Jim said. "You know, in case she sets off an alarm she wasn't counting on or someone notices that the pendant is gone before she has a chance to get out. If one of those things happened, they'd be searching everyone leaving the museum. She'd have to have some other way out in that case."

Biff groaned. "You mean, talk to her again? You can count me out of that. I've had enough of her."

"Come on, Jim; it's your idea," Phil said. "You and I will go talk to her."

They had locked Sonja in their former cell. More than one of them had had misgivings about this, since they had no way of unlocking the cell again once they had closed the door for real. Still, most of them felt that it was really their only choice. Letting Sonja loose might very well end in disaster for them.

After they had locked Sonja up, the boys had gone to work building the barricade in front of the door while Callie and Iola had gone around to their classmates and any other prisoners who spoke English and explained that they had no means of unlocking any more cells but that they were working on an escape plan. They were just rejoining the boys when Jim suggested talking to Sonja again.

Jim glanced toward the cell where Sonja was imprisoned and swallowed hard. "Maybe it's not such a good idea. She probably won't tell us."

"Aw, come on. She won't bite." Phil grabbed him by the arm and steered him toward the cell.

Sonja was standing in the middle of the cell with her back to the door and her arms crossed in front of her.

"Um, excuse me," Phil said. Sonja ignored him. "Sonja, you've got as much of an interest in this as any of us. Do you know another way out of the castle?"

Sonja glanced over her shoulder. "Maybe, maybe not. It doesn't really matter to you anymore. You blew your chance when you locked me in here. It'll suit me just fine if the revolutionaries come in here, because I know who has the Pendant and I can offer them that information in exchange for my freedom. If that's the best I can do, it's a pretty disappointing day, but it's a whole lot better than helping you folks put me in a Laurenian jail. You have any idea what those are like? Oh, no. You're young and innocent American teenagers. You wouldn't even be able to imagine anything like that."

"Maybe you should have thought of that before you decided to steal that pendant in the first place," Jim pointed out.

"Maybe, but then where would y'all be? Dead, that's where. Those revolutionaries wouldn't have had to ask your buddies to help them find the Pendant, so they would have just shot all of you. Of course, if that's what you prefer to someone breaking one, tiny little law by stealing something from someone it doesn't rightfully belong to in the first place, then go ahead with your righteousness."

"What are you talking about?" Phil asked. "You're saying the Pendant doesn't belong to the Laurenian government? Who would it belong to then?"

"Oh, I don't know, the last surviving member of the Laurenian royal family, possibly," Sonja said.

"You're not…" Jim began, but he shook his head. "Then I'd know you were out of your head if you were claiming to be some kind of princess."

Sonja laughed. "Wouldn't that be cute? Personally, I think I'd make a great princess. I've got all the qualifications I need: smarts, looks. Everything, in fact, except having a drop of royal blood. No, I'm no more the lost heir to the throne of Laurenia than you are the lost heir of the Emperor of China. But I know who is."

Phil and Jim glanced at one another, unsure whether to believe her or not or if they believed her, then what they should do about it.

"So, you're saying that you stole the Ruby Pendant to give to some lost princess?" Jim asked.

"Or prince," Sonja corrected him. She feigned surprise. "Surely, you didn't think I'd steal it for myself? You must think I'm a terrible person. Well, I guess I did sort of threaten to slit your friends' throats, so I don't exactly blame you. Still, murder and stealing something like the Ruby Pendant are two very different things."

"Yeah, and murder is a lot worse, so don't think you're going to convince us that you're not so bad after all," Phil said. "Anyway, you just said you'd be willing to trade the Pendant for your freedom, so I suspect you're lying about this."

"Hmm. My sources were sadly mistaken about all of you," Sonja said. "They said all the Hardy Boys' friends were complete idiots, but it turns out you're possibly not _complete_ idiots."

Jim rolled his eyes. "Thanks. We're so flattered."

"Why were you researching Frank and Joe?" Phil asked. "You couldn't have known that we'd turn up at the museum at the same time as you."

"Actually, I could know that," Sonja told him. "I almost thought about switching the whole plan to a different day because of it, but that would have been so much work. See, I had a couple of partners in this whole thing. One of them was that silly Marius, and the other is an employee here at the museum. Lest you think the worst of them, they weren't too willing, so I sort of had to twist both their arms. Anyway, through the one partner, I learned that a group of American tourists was scheduled to come here today, and there's so much bureaucratic red tape in everything here in Laurenia, I was able to get a list of the exact names. So I did my homework."

"You must have also done your homework on your extraction plan," Phil said.

Sonja snorted and bent over double laughing. "Did you really just say that with a straight face? Okay, maybe my sources weren't so wrong after all, huh?"

Phil gritted his teeth in annoyance. "Did you or did you not have a plan for getting out of this building?"

Sonja stared at him, a little bit of a smile flickering on her face, but she said nothing.

In the stillness, Iola caught a sound from the other side of the door and stiffened. "There's someone out there."

"Then our barricade is probably just about to get tested," Biff said. "Everybody get out of the way!"

They all stepped back from in front of the doors and into the protection of the stone walls. There was a rattling at the doorknob, angry voices, and then something was rammed into the door, causing it and the makeshift "barricade" to shudder.

HBHBHBHBHB

"If Chet's in trouble, we've got to go get him out," Joe said, all set to run out to the rescue.

"Hold on." Frank put out a hand as if to hold his brother back. "Chet might not be in trouble at all. His radio might have run out of batteries, or maybe he's in the tunnel and can't pick up the signal from our radio."

Joe relaxed a tiny bit. "I guess that could be," he admitted. "Still, aren't we going to make sure?"

Frank glanced around at the other people in the room. Vanessa was sitting on a trunk, trying to compose herself, while Kristen was still sulking in a corner. Mr. Byron was pacing back and forth with his hands behind his back. Illya Láska looked the most unconcerned as he sat on the one chair in the room, doing nothing except clasping his hand over the pocket where he was keeping the Pendant.

"I don't think it's a good idea to split up even more," Frank said, speaking quietly so that none of the others could overhear him. "I don't like the thought of Chet being alone, and I'm worried sick about Callie and Iola, of course, but what can we do on our own? We don't even know what's going on."

"Then I think it's high time to figure that out," Joe replied. "What do we have so far?"

"We know Sonja stole the Pendant, but we don't know why," Frank said. "We also know that Marius knows something about her, and that she needed someone like him to pull the theft off."

"So, Marius and Sonja working together could be one thesis." Joe folded his arms as he thought it over. "It works pretty well. Marius could have figured out how to disconnect the alarm, or he might have even insisted on the museum disconnecting the alarm themselves while he and his men worked. Then he could have easily made sure that everyone was late this morning. The secret passage that he knew about could have been their planned escape route. Then maybe Sonja's the really crazy one of the pair who is willing to do whatever it takes, while Marius never actually wanted to hurt anyone. That could be why he was so insistent that Sonja wasn't going to let the girls go even if we cooperated with her. Then the person he went back for could have been Sonja herself."

Frank nodded. "It holds together pretty well. The problem is that there's not a shred of evidence to back it up."

"Yeah," Joe agreed. "I don't know that I like Marius going back for Sonja, anyway. It's hard to tell over a radio, but it sounded to me more like he hated her than that he'd go back into the fire for her."

"Maybe Sonja was forcing Marius into helping her by holding someone else captive."

"Then why wouldn't he have said anything about it?"

"He might not have trusted us," Frank said. "You've got to admit, none of us have exactly been acting like normal teenagers thrown into a situation like this. I mean, we know that this isn't our first time in a situation like this and we've got to stay calm and cool about, and it's the same for Chet and the rest of the guys. You know how much Illya's complete lack of emotion of any kind has been weirding us out. Maybe we're doing the same to Marius."

"Okay, that makes sense," Joe admitted, "but I'm still going to maintain that Illya is way weirder than we could ever be."

"Whatever." Frank gave a small shake of his head. "Anyway, that would mean that there's a third person involved in this, and that that third person must be in the castle, since Marius presumably went back for them."

"Right. But they couldn't have been locked in the dungeon, since Marius wouldn't have left them then. That narrows it down to one of the museum employees, which makes sense. They'd be able to help Sonja in their own right, possibly because she was threatening Marius, too. I have a hunch I know which one it was, too: Natalia."

"Why her?" Frank asked.

"She knew something when we were interviewing her," Joe said. "I don't know what she knew, but it was something that Illya didn't want her to tell us. Which, I guess, means that Illya must know what it was. I would assume that the only information that Illya would be particularly opposed to us getting would be something to do with where the Pendant was. Illya also cooperated with Sonja pretty easily."

"You think Sonja and Illya are working together, too?"

Joe shrugged. "Stranger things have happened. I don't know. There's another thing, too, though, about Natalia. She was scared of something when she first came in. At first, I figured it was, you know, the masked guys with machine guns who were threatening everybody, but from the way she stood up to Demyan and was arguing with him, I don't think so. She must have been scared of something else. Sonja, maybe?"

"Could be," Frank agreed. "So, we've got Sonja working with Marius and Natalia as her unwilling partners. Then there's Illya, who may or may not be involved in that whole scheme. Now, how does Demyan and his people fit in?"

"They seem pretty straightforward," Joe said.

"But is just a coincidence that they planned their invasion or whatever you want to call it for the same day that Sonja planned her burglary? It would be a pretty weird one if it was."

Joe began to respond, but at that moment, they heard footsteps outside the door in the hallway. Vanessa jumped to her feet and everyone looked toward the door.

Frank glanced around the room for possible hiding places. There was no other chance in going up against armed opponents. Unfortunately, there was nothing that could provide really good cover, except for a door at the opposite end of the room.

"Van, go see what's behind that door," Frank said. "If it's a way out of this room, it looks like we'll have to take it."

"Right," Vanessa agreed. She sprinted to the door and opened it a crack to peer through. "It leads into another hallway, all right. I don't know which one. I'm so lost in this place."

"No time to worry about that," Joe told her. "Let's go!"

First Vanessa and then Kristen slipped through the door. The others were about to follow them when there was a loud splintering sound and someone kicked open the other door. Joe pushed the one that the girls had escaped through closed with his foot just as two men in black masks stepped through the opposite door.


	11. Chapter 11

J.M.J.

_A/N: Thank you so much for reading, and for being patient with the little bit of an extra wait for this chapter! In particular, thank you to Candylou, Drumboy100 (also thanks again for the PM to explain the poem you accidentally posted without the explanation – LOL!), max2013, Cherylann Rivers, ErinJordan, EvergreenDreamweaver, and angelicalkiss for your reviews since I posted the last chapter! _

**Chapter XI**

Joe clenched his fists. They had eluded Demyan and his masked compatriots for long enough that the thought of recapture was almost too much for him. He was half ready to fight his way out of this if that was the only way. He glanced at Frank for confirmation.

Frank, however, wasn't about to risk anybody's lives. If the only way to get everyone through this was to surrender to the revolutionaries, that was what he was prepared to do.

Illya also had an idea of fighting his way out, although for him, it was more than just a thought. He made a move toward the machine gun of which he had relieved the guard that they had escaped from earlier.

One of the masked men held out one hand and ripped off his mask with the other. "Whoa, whoa, whoa! Hold on! We come in peace!"

"Biff!" Joe exclaimed as the other removed his mask to reveal the face of Jerry. "Jerry! What are you guys doing here? And how did you get those clothes?"

"Same way Illya here must have gotten his," Biff replied. "It's kind of a long story, but the gist of it is that we got out of that cell in the dungeon and then tried to barricade ourselves into the dungeon room, but then two of the goons broke in."

"Then we jumped them," Jerry interjected. "We talked it over, and Biff and I thought that taking their clothes and using those to sneak out of the basement was the best plan, but Phil said no. We argued about it for a while, and then finally, Iola said that you guys had done the same thing when you jumped one of these fellows, and Phil couldn't really argue against that. I mean, if you Hardys don't think it's a dumb idea…"

"Wait," Joe interrupted. "You mean Iola was with you? Was Callie there, too?"

"Sure," Biff said. "Those guys caught them and took them to the dungeon. That crazy Sonja person, too. It kind of back-fired on them, though, now."

"So they're safe," Frank said with obvious relief in his voice.

"As safe as any of us are right now," Biff told him, "which isn't super safe, anyway. It's a lucky thing we found you guys, though."

"That really was just luck," Jerry put in. "We ran into a whole bunch of those guys, and they started shouting something at us in their language. We didn't have a clue what they were saying, but all of them were kicking in doors, so we figured we'd do the same. That seemed to satisfy them, and they just let us be."

"That's great," Frank said. "Is everyone else still down in the basement?" Biff and Jerry confirmed that, and Frank nodded. "Okay. Now maybe we have a chance at containing this situation."

"What do you have in mind, Frank?" Mr. Byron asked. "I think it's about time we get out of here."

"It's way past time for that," Joe said. "Now that everybody's accounted for…"

"Hold on," Jerry interrupted. "Where's Chet? And Vanessa? And that annoying Kristen?"

"Well, Chet's only sort of accounted for," Joe admitted. "Finding him needs to be our next priority. As for Vanessa and Kristen, they're just right outside." He opened the door and peered outside, but the girls were nowhere in sight. His shoulders slumped. "Or not. Why can't anyone just stay put today?"

"They couldn't have gotten too far," Frank said. "Let's try to find them. All three of you who have masks had better put them back on. With three of you, and then Illya able to speak their language, we might be able to bluff our way past any of the others that we run into. We might also be able to learn what happened to Chet and the girls, if it turns out that anything has actually happened to them."

"That plan might work," Illya acknowledged. "There's just one flaw in it. I'm not coming with you. You can try to save your own lives if you like, but I cannot go with you."

"For crying out loud, why not?" Jerry burst out. "Do you want to stay here and get murdered?"

Illya softly shook his head. "Hardly. I have no more wish to die than any of you. For that reason, I do not blame you for your attempts to escape. Under other circumstances…Aw, but you wouldn't understand. Outsiders never do, especially not Americans. The Pendant is too important. I can't take the risk of letting it fall into the hands of these barbarians."

"You're still taking a risk…" Frank began, but Joe interrupted him.

"Look, here," Joe said. He took a step toward Illya. "I've had just about all I can take of you. What is your problem? Is it that you don't realize that every single one of us, including yourself, could get killed? Or is it that you don't care? You can't really believe that you're protecting that hunk of gold. If you did, you'd actually be trying to get it out of the building. So, what's your deal? Are you in with Demyan and his cronies, trying to overthrow your government? Maybe that's why Demyan made such a big deal about how you deserve to die and then never got around to killing you. He was probably trying to allay our suspicions. Or maybe you and Sonja plotted this whole thing out together to try to make an extra buck. Either way, you're double crossing whoever it is you're working with."

Illya shook his head and a little flush of anger came into his cheeks. "I told you, you could not understand. Do you think I could betray my country?"

"You don't have any regard for other people's lives. Why should you have any regard for your country?" Joe continued. "For that matter, you were whining earlier about how Americans are all lazy, over-privileged ingrates who never lift a finger to help anybody else, but the way I see it, we're doing more for your country than you are. We're actually trying to help the people of your country by helping them to escape. You're just holding onto a piece of history which doesn't mean a whole lot if you don't care about the present. You know what I think? I don't think that little rant was really about Americans. I think it was about you, and how you know that when it comes right down to it, you don't think about anyone but yourself. Maybe if you stopped whining about how terrible everybody else is and actually tried…"

"Shut up!" Illya shouted, grabbing Joe by the front of the shirt. "You don't know anything about all this. This is a game to you, and the winner gets to live. Perhaps if you hadn't spent your entire life in so much comfort, you'd realize that there are some things that are worth dying for and some things that have to be done no matter what the cost."

Frank and Mr. Byron both stepped forward, prepared to force Illya to let go of Joe if necessary. However, it wasn't necessary. Illya's calm – which was evidently not so unshakeable as they had imagined – returned and he released Joe on his own.

"We don't have time for this," Mr. Byron said. "We need to find Vanessa, Kristen, and Chet and get someplace safe to wait for rescue. It must be coming eventually. Perhaps we can barricade ourselves in the dungeons again, though more securely this time. I think that would be the wisest course of action. If you don't want to join us, Mr. Láska, we're sorry, and we all think that you're being unwise, but we're not going to waste any more time trying to persuade you. Now, come on, we need to be going."

"I wish we had some way to call the others to tell them what we're doing, just so they don't decide to try to leave," Frank said.

"Well, Callie still has her cell phone," Biff told him, "but that doesn't help a whole lot when none of the rest of us do."

Illya sighed and took his from his pocket. He handed it to Frank and said, "Here. Take it. I hope you will get to safety with your friends, but I still cannot come."

Frank accepted the phone. "Thanks. And I hope you get that pendant back where it belongs."

He looked Illya in the eye as he said it, and they seemed to come to some kind of understanding. Then the five Bayporters headed out through the door through which Vanessa and Kristen had gone earlier.

HBHBHBHBHB

Several minutes earlier, Vanessa and Kristen had been startled when the door had closed behind them before the Hardys, Mr. Byron, and Illya could follow them. The girls had glanced at one another, momentarily trying to decide what to do. Vanessa was about to say that they ought to wait and see what was going on with the others when Kristen took off running. Vanessa watched her for a moment, half-tempted to let her go, but then she decided that they had better keep together and ran after her.

Kristen made a few corners and then halted, panting, which gave Vanessa time to catch up to her. Neither girl spoke for a few seconds as they tried to catch their breath.

"What's the idea?" Vanessa asked finally. "Now we might never be able to get back to the others. I know you're scared, but running off and making things even worse doesn't even make sense."

Kristen took a long, shuddering breath. There were tears in her eyes. "I'm sorry. I wasn't thinking. I'm not perfect like you are."

Vanessa let out an exasperated sigh. "I never said I was perfect or better than you or anything. I just…That's not even the issue right. I'm sorry. I guess I'm not thinking, either. I'm just as scared as you are."

"I doubt that." Kristen had her arms folded and was looking down at the floor. "I doubt the great Vanessa has a single flaw to her entire perfect character."

Vanessa shook her head in disbelief. "I don't usually say things like this about people, but you really are the stupidest, nastiest, most spiteful person I've ever met. We could very well be about to die here and all you can do is keep right on tearing into me about something that I apparently did to offend you. Is that really…" She paused before she finished the question. Then she almost laughed. "You know, I was going to ask if that's really how you want to spend your last moments on earth, but I guess I should be asking myself the same question. While you're all stuck on being mad at me, I'm being just as stuck on being mad at you for being mad at me. So, you know what? I'm done playing this game. Why don't we call a truce?"

She held out a hand, but Kristen merely looked at it as if shaking hands was an alien idea for her. "There you go again. Perfect Vanessa. Always able to smooth things over with everybody. Always getting everything you want."

"I, uh…" Vanessa furrowed her brow. She honestly had no idea what Kristen was talking about. "Excuse me, but we don't know each other all that well. This is literally the longest conversation I've ever had with you. What makes you an expert on my life all of a sudden?" They were fighting words, but Vanessa wasn't stopping to think right now.

Kristen began crying for real now. "It's not fair. I know you aren't used to being criticized for anything. That's not the way it is for the rest of us lowly humans. Do you even have any idea what it's like to not be able to even breathe without people telling you you're doing it wrong?"

Vanessa shook her head. "Look, this isn't the time for this…"

"If you're right – and, of course, you always are – and we're possibly going to die, what better time could there be?" Kristen argued. "Everybody will just remember me as the annoying girl that nobody liked without even giving me a chance, and they'll all remember you as the perfect and amazing girl that everybody loved without you even having to do anything."

Vanessa ran a hand through her long, ash-blonde hair. "This is so stupid. I can't believe that this might actually be how I spend my last few moments on earth."

"It might be if you don't be quiet," a voice broke in.

The girls had been so engrossed in their argument that neither of them had heard the newcomer approach, and so his interruption came as a shock. Vanessa jumped and Kristen shrieked.

"Shh!" Marius warned them, stepping the rest of the way around the corner. "You're being loud enough to wake the dead, though there are hopefully still no dead around here to wake."

"Where did you come from?" Kristen asked him.

"Where's Chet?" Vanessa added.

"Safely outside this wretched castle, if he's smart," Marius replied. "I left him by the entrance to the passage out."

"Why did you leave?" Vanessa asked.

"I had to look for someone," Marius told her. "I can't find her. I don't know where these barbarians could have put her."

"Sonja?" Vanessa was having a hard time keeping up with all of this.

Marius looked almost offended. "Certainly not. My fiancée, Natalia. She works in this museum. They put her and the other officials in a different spot than the rest of us. I don't know where it is."

"Well, we wouldn't know either." Kristen put her hand to her forehead. "I'm so tired. I just want to go home."

"We're all tired," Marius assured her. "How did you get separated from the others?"

Vanessa was tempted to tell him that it was Kristen's fault, but she didn't. "We went through a door, but I don't really know what happened to them. I'm afraid they might have been captured."

Marius nodded slowly. "It looks as if Chet is our best chance now. I hope he went through the tunnel as he was supposed to. I could tell he was afraid. I should have stayed him." He gave a small, bitter laugh. "If I had only done what I should have, this day would have gone very differently for all of us."

"I don't really see what you've had to do with it," Vanessa said. "Nobody could have known that these revolutionaries were coming here today."

"No, not that," Marius said, "but there is something I must confess to. I helped Sonja with all this. I helped her plan it and I helped her pull it off. I…It sounds so foolish now. She told me that she knew a man who was descended from the royal family. Impossible, of course, since they were all killed. It must sound even stranger to you, being Americans, but there has been so much discord in Laurenia for so long, that it came as a wild ray of hope and it didn't seem like a wrong thing to do at first. So I agreed. Then, in thinking it over, I realized just how foolish the whole plan was. I tried to back out and go to the police, and that was when Sonja began threatening Natalia. Then I realized just how insane Sonja really is. I don't think there ever was any prince; I'm sure it's just something she told me to try to get me to help her. The one thing I am sure of is that she would have carried out her threats against Natalia, but maybe if I had been fast enough and clever enough I could have gone to the authorities and kept her safe." He took a deep breath. "There. I've admitted to it. Now, the question none of us have yet been able to answer: what should we do?"

"If you know where that secret passage is, could you just take us there?" Kristen asked. "I just want to get out of here."

Marius glanced over his shoulder. "All right," he said finally. "Follow me."

"I don't want to go without the others," Vanessa protested.

"There's no time for you to try to impress everybody by acting like a hero," Kristen told her.

"And there is also no time for you to argue," Marius said. "Come on. We're going now."

Although Vanessa still had her misgivings, she followed them down the hallways. As it turned out, they were much closer to the secret passage room than Vanessa had thought, but then she had gotten all turned around in the castle.

"It's just around another corner," Marius informed them after a few minutes. "We need to be careful."

He gestured for the girls to stay put while he went ahead. Vanessa nodded and remained behind patiently, but Kristen hopped from one foot to the other as she waited. Marius had hardly been gone for a full minute when the sound of heavy boots reached the girls' ears.

"Uh, Marius?" Kristen said and darted after him.

Vanessa tried to reach her to pull her back, but she wasn't quick enough. When Kristen stepped out, Marius was nowhere to be seen, but there was a trio of masked gunmen in his place.

One of them said in perfect though accented English, "Well, well. Another of our escapees. But perhaps you can be used to better purpose than the last ones we captured."

Vanessa considered jumping forward, but she couldn't see how allowing herself to be captured would help the situation in any way. Instead, she backed up and slipped through the nearest door.

HBHBHBHBHB

"We must have taken a wrong turn somewhere," Biff said, speaking quietly. "This is taking way longer to get back than it took to get here. Or there. You know, to where we met up with you guys."

Frank sighed. He was getting tired of feeling as helpless as he had all day. "We're just going in circles now."

"No, this has to be the right way," Jerry insisted. "I was being careful to keep track of where we turned."

"More arguing isn't going to do us any good," Mr. Byron intervened. "I've had all the more I can take of all of you arguing as it is. Frank's right that we're going in circles. If we can't find our way back to where the other students…"

He was interrupted by the loudspeaker system that had been installed throughout the castle. "Hardys, this is Demyan. We have captured one of your friends. She is in the main courtyard. If you wish to save her life, you will immediately give yourselves up there."


	12. Chapter 12

J.M.J.

_A/N: Thank you so much for continuing to read! Thank you especially to Drumboy100, max2013, Candylou, Cherylann Rivers, ErinJordan, EvergreenDreamweaver, and angelicalkiss for your reviews since I posted chapter 11. Now, here it is, the final chapter!_

**Chapter XII**

Frank and Joe looked at one another as Demyan's voice faded from the loudspeaker. Even as the words seemed to settle on their hearts like crows over a cornfield, a little spark of fighting spirit rose up in Joe.

"Looks like we're in for a final showdown," he said. "It's about time. Let's put an end to all of this."

"How?" Mr. Byron asked. "I don't see how surrendering yourselves is going to put an end to any of this."

"It will if we play our cards right," Joe told him. "First, let's look at what cards we've got. There's you three, for one. Demyan didn't say anything about you three turning yourselves over to him, so maybe he doesn't know you're with us. You might be able to act as backup. Then there's the fact that we know where the Pendant is. We can't hand Illya over to them, of course, even if he is probably a crook, but we might be able to do some bargaining with just the fact that we know where it's at. Finally, there's Chet. If he's the one that they've caught, then we're out of luck on that one, but if he isn't, then he probably did get through that tunnel, and that means that help is not only on the way, but also has a way in."

"It's not exactly four aces," Frank said, "but I think we can make a decent hand out of these cards if we play them right. We'd better treat the Chet card as the ace up our sleeve and see if we can win without it. If the terrorists know about it, they'll just panic and that might turn out worse for everyone."

"Right. That means we've only got four cards left, which isn't enough for a full hand," Joe went on. "Looks like we'll have to bluff our way through."

"There are two of us," Frank reminded him. "And they want both of us. We can use that to our advantage."

Joe grinned. "I like that thinking. Let's not forget that we have that radio, too. Okay, so what's our plan here?"

"I think I've got one," Frank replied.

HBHBHBHBHB

Vanessa and Marius crept back along the hallways of the castle, trying to follow the revolutionaries to wherever they were taking Kristen. Finally, when they heard the loudspeaker and knew that they had taken her to the courtyard, Marius signaled for Vanessa to follow him up to a balcony overlooking the courtyard. They stayed low and out of sight, but they could see the group of masked men standing around Kristen, who looked terrified. Their backs were turned, and so the two watchers weren't particularly concerned about being spotted.

"Do you really think your friends will be turning up soon?" Marius asked.

"I'm sure of it," Vanessa replied. "Frank and Joe would never leave any of us in a lurch like this, not even Kristen, if they knew who it was."

"I still think we may have been more use going for help through the passage," Marius said.

"Chet can handle that," Vanessa assured. "He must be out by now. Frank and Joe are going to try to rescue Kristen, and they might need backup. We just have to hold on a little longer now."

Someone shouted down in the courtyard, drawing Vanessa's attention. She looked down and saw Frank approaching from the far side of the courtyard. Joe wasn't with him. He approached the terrorists with a confident step.

Demyan stepped forward to meet him. "Where is your brother? I thought I was clear in saying that I wanted both of you."

Frank ignored the jibe. "He's somewhere. There are a few conditions that you're going to have to agree to before he gives himself up. I'm here as a show of good faith on our part."

"What conditions?" Demyan sneered. "The only conditions we're interested in are the ones that we've set forth for you: that unless both you and your brother giver yourselves up, we will kill your friend there."

Frank looked over Demyan's shoulder at Kristen, who was wide-eyed with fear. "Please, Frank, don't let them!" she pleaded.

"Before you do that, I think you'll want to consider our conditions," Frank told him. "For one thing, while we were wandering around the castle, trying to avoid you people, we made a discovery."

It was impossible to read Demyan's expression through the mask, but he seemed to freeze. "I see. That was a foolish admission to make. Now we will know that there is some point in persuading you."

"Yes, that's why Joe didn't come out here with me," Frank said. "You see, only Joe could tell you where exactly our 'discovery' is. I'd like to flatter myself by thinking that I wouldn't tell you where our 'discovery' is under any circumstances, but it's best not to expect too much from yourself, so I honestly can't tell you where Joe is right now. So you can do whatever you want to me, and I won't be able to help you."

"Clever," Demyan admitted begrudgingly. "So. What are your conditions?"

"First, and most important, of course, is that you let our friend here go without hurting her in anyway," Frank said. "Secondly, and of equal importance, is that you let all of your hostages go without harming them."

"For that, you will have to somehow secure the word of the authorities out there that they will also let us go," Demyan said. "If you can do that, I'll certainly make any deal you want, because you would clearly be a most powerful ally and a most fearsome enemy. Otherwise, I think we will be content to just continue searching as we have been doing."

"Our third condition," Frank went on doggedly, "is that you answer all the questions we have for you. If you do that, we have something pretty handsome to offer you."

"I would not call immediate capture particularly handsome," Demyan replied.

"And I wouldn't call what we have to offer 'immediate capture'," Frank retorted. "But if you don't want to listen, I won't force you to."

"I'm listening," Demyan said. "In return, you will give us this 'discovery' of yours. It's a tempting offer, I suppose, but I think it is rather unfairly in your favor."

"There's another part to it," Frank went on. "If you do as I ask, Joe and I will personally show you a way out of this castle."

Demyan paused. Then he laughed. "I like this. All right. I'll play your game, for the moment. I'll start with your third request. What questions do you have for me?"

Frank felt his pulse quicken just a little. He had a feeling that Demyan realized that this was a last, desperate trick but was playing along as a trick of his own. Still, the best that Frank could do was to continue playing his own part. "Very well, but you realize that if you refuse to answer a single question, the deal is off."

"In which case, there will be nothing to prevent us killing your friend," Demyan pointed out.

Kristen gasped and began to shake.

"But don't forget that we might very well have your only chance for getting out of here alive," Frank reminded him. "I think you might be willing to cooperate with us for that."

"What are your questions?" Demyan repeated.

"First of all, who are you really?" Frank asked. "If you really are revolutionaries, what are you really trying to accomplish? And if you're not, then what's the point of all of this?"

"If all your questions are so simple to answer, then I will feel I have gotten myself a very good deal, on this part of the terms, at least," Demyan replied. "We are who we say we are: citizens of Laurenia who have suffered long enough under one oppressive regime after another and now have the courage to risk life and personal liberty to secure the freedom of all our people. I thought that was something that Americans admired. The fact that you don't is just another proof of your people's hypocrisy."

"I don't think so," Frank said. "Most Americans, including myself, do admire such things, but only when it's for a justifiable cause and when it's not merely replacing one tyranny with another. I don't really know how bad your government is, but I don't think anyone who would hold civilians hostage and threaten to kill them can be much better. Anyway, though, I'm here to question you, not to preach at you. Why do you think that the Ruby Pendant is so important for your cause? I understand that it is an important part of Laurenian history, but as such, if you really are doing this for your country, wouldn't you want to safeguard it instead of steal it and risk damaging or losing it?"

"They have told you that the Pendant is a symbol of Laurenia," Demyan told him. "That is a lie. It is a symbol of the royal family, who were the worst tyrants of them all. The day they were executed for their crimes was one of the most joyous days in our country's long and miserable history."

Frank folded his arms. "I can't agree with you there. Executing children, anyone's children, isn't anything to celebrate in my book. I've heard a rumor that there's a descendant of the royal family still living. I take it, then, that you're not acting on that person's behalf in trying to return them to the throne."

"Certainly not," Demyan said. "I would sooner die than see this country return to the tyranny of a monarchy."

"Interesting," Frank commented. "Then what type of government do you actually want?"

"The communists made mistakes," Demyan replied. "They failed in what they were trying to do, but we know better now. We will take their principles and use them as they ought to be used. If we are only given a chance, perhaps we can do better."

"Once again, interesting," Frank said, for lack of a better response. There was a good deal he could have said to that, but he didn't have any real hope of changing Demyan's mind and it seemed best to him to continue asking questions and stalling for time that way rather than getting into an argument and risking getting Demyan angry. "Let's go back to the Pendant for a minute now. You said before that you intended to sell it. How did you expect to get a buyer for it? In a way, that could be almost more difficult than stealing it in the first place."

"True," Demyan admitted. "Even though I have always hated the thought of the Pendant being safeguarded here, I would not have attempted to take it if I had not had a buyer already in place to ensure that the risk would not be in vain."

"Who is your buyer?" Frank asked. "How did you meet them?"

"Do you think I would give you the name of my own buyer? They would be most angry."

"No doubt," Frank agreed, "but what could they do to you? Surely, you weren't careless enough to reveal your identities to them."

"Ordinarily, I would not be," Demyan said. "But these are no ordinary buyers. They contacted me, personally, offering me a price that was more than fair to steal the Pendant for them. I don't know what they could do in retaliation for giving you their names, but I wouldn't like to find out."

There was a sound from above. Frank, Kristen, Demyan, and most of Demyan's men looked up toward it, toward the balcony where Vanessa and Marius were watching the entire scene play out. They tried to duck out of sight, but they weren't quick enough. Demyan gave an order to his men in their language, and several of them took off running toward the balcony.

Frank took in a sharp breath. This was an unexpected difficulty, and it was about to make everything much more difficult.

HBHBHBHBHB

While Frank had been talking to Demyan and essentially stalling for time, Joe and the others had been busy. Joe, Biff, and Jerry were working their way around the terrorists, hoping to get in behind them. Biff and Jerry would then, in their disguises, join the terrorists and wait for an opportunity to get Kristen away from them. Meanwhile, Joe was planning out an escape route and different ways that they could delay pursuers should they be pursued.

The plan had been working out just fine. Jerry and Biff were already standing on the fringes of the group of terrorists and were edging their way toward Kristen, ready to grab her at Frank's signal. Joe just about had the escape route back to the dungeons memorized. He was helped in this by the map that Sonja had given his friends, and which Biff and Jerry had brought with them. He had lost a little time in studying a design that someone, presumably Sonja, had drawn in one corner of the map. It was a circle with lines sticking out from the top, bottom, left, and right. In the middle of the circle was a letter A, and each of the lines had a letter attached to them as well. The upward line had a B, the downward line had an N, the left line had a Z, and the right had an E. The words "four winds" were written underneath.

Otherwise, it looked as if the plan would work, up until either Vanessa or Marius bumped into something or kicked something or otherwise made enough noise to attract Demyan's attention. Biff and Jerry hesitated, unsure whether they should follow the gunmen who were headed in Vanessa's direction or if they should stay behind and still try to grab Kristen if they got the chance.

To make matters worse, in the momentary confusion, each lost track of which one the other was. Biff managed to get right next to Kristen and take hold of one of her arms. To his relief, the real guard who was holding her let go and went off with the others. Jerry, on the other hand, got swept up with the departing gunmen.

Joe was the last to realize what was going on, since he hadn't been in the courtyard. The first he knew of it was when Vanessa and Marius came running out of one door and one of the terrorists out of another. Marius launched himself at the gunman and began struggling with him. Vanessa looked at Joe as if for help in deciding what to do.

Joe couldn't help her with that, but he did know what he himself intended to do. He jumped into the fight as well. Marius had already knocked the gun out of his opponent's hands – the masked man didn't seem too interested in holding onto it, anyway – and between both him and Joe, they were able to subdue him in seconds, especially considering that he barely fought back.

"It's me, you idiots," the masked man whispered to them in English. It was Illya's voice.

"You!" Joe retorted. "I thought you'd run out on us to protect your precious Pendant."

"I changed my mind," Illya replied. "You'd better all start running. I'll try to buy you as much time as I can."

"You two had better go," Joe told Vanessa and Marius. "I've got to stay and hold up my end of the plan."

"Don't be stupid," Illya said. "I don't know what your plan was, but it's as good as ruined now. Just go."

"This might not be something _you_ understand," Joe retorted, "but I'm not going to leave my brother and my friends in trouble when they're counting on me. But really, Vanessa, there's nothing you can do to help with the plan, so you and – I assume this is the Marius we've been hearing about – had better just go."

"I don't want to run off and do nothing," Vanessa protested.

"You might be able to help, actually," Joe told her. "If you happen to meet the rescue party who is hopefully on their way, you can point them in the right direction."

The sound of heavy footsteps in the hall signaled that they had run out of time for further discussion. Marius and Vanessa ran in one direction, while Joe stepped toward the door that they had come through moments earlier. None of them, however, were quick enough to escape the notice of the approaching gunmen. One of the gunmen shouted something to Illya in Laurenian.

Illya's only reply was to raise the gun that he had taken from the guard that he had jumped earlier. Instantly, Joe could see two major flaws with this move. For one, Illya was drastically outnumbered, and even armed, he wouldn't stand a chance. Secondly, Joe had no way of knowing whether Biff and Jerry had managed to remain in the courtyard or if they were in the approaching group. He couldn't risk letting one of them get hit. He reached out the door and dragged Illya through just as a burst of gunfire exploded.

Joe kicked the door shut after him. It was made of sturdy oak, but there was no chance of it holding up for more than a few seconds under machine gun fire. Nevertheless, Joe turned the lock on it.

Then he saw that Illya was sitting on the floor, blood oozing from a wound in his leg. Joe grabbed him by the arm and dragged him out onto the balcony, stumbling over some loose stones that had fallen from above at some point. If they stayed low, no one in the courtyard would be able to see them.

"That was a dumb thing to do," Joe said, carefully looking over the edge to survey the situation below. Only Frank, Kristen, Demyan, and two other gunmen who were each holding onto one of Kristen's arms remained in the courtyard below. Joe hoped that the other two were Biff and Jerry, but he knew he couldn't count on it.

"I know," Illya said through gritted teeth. "But I did stop whining and actually try…"

Joe shook his head. "When I told you to try thinking about other people for a change, I didn't mean to commit suicide." He could hear the gunmen breaking down the door. At least they weren't using their machine guns. That saved a little more time. "Where's the Pendant?"

"What difference does it make?" Illya asked.

"A lot," Joe insisted. "Do you have it? Give it to me!"

Illya hesitated, but the urgency in Joe's tone and the desperate situation didn't leave much room for argument. He pulled the Ruby Pendant from his pocket and placed it in Joe's hand. Joe looked at it for a second or two. Then he pushed himself up with his opposite hand and sprang to his feet.

"Demyan!" he shouted. He held up the Pendant. "Do you still want this?" He held the Pendant just long enough for Demyan to see what it was. Then he curled his fist around it and hurled it over the balcony.

HBHBHBHBHB

While all this was going on, Mr. Byron had been working on contacting someone outside the castle either with the radio or the cell phone that Illya had given them. He also called Callie's phone and explained to her what was going on.

Finally, there was a crackle of static over the radio, followed by Chet's voice.

"Chet, are you there?" Mr. Byron asked.

"I'm here, Mr. Byron," Chet replied. "I finally made it out of that secret passage. Boy, is that place a maze. I thought for sure it was a dead end for a while. I finally figured it out, though."

"Is there help coming?" Mr. Byron asked, more interested at the moment in that than in Chet's adventures in the secret passage.

"Oh, sure," Chet told him. "They're on their way through the tunnel. They didn't let me come. But they should figure out how to get through much faster than I did, mostly because they have flashlights."

"We need them to know to come to the main courtyard," Mr. Byron said. "The gunmen are holding Kristen hostage and Frank and Joe are trying to stall for time."

"I'll get someone here to radio them," Chet assured him.

Mr. Byron breathed a little easier. Maybe they would get out of this in one piece after all.

HBHBHBHBHB

Jerry dropped back in the group of gunmen as soon as he could. He had an idea that he might mislead them by shouting the wrong directions, but fortunately, he realized in time that shouting wrong directions in English would hardly fool the gunmen.

To his relief, the others went on when he dropped back. He paused for breath and considered his options. He decided he would go back and see what Frank and Joe were going to do about this new development. Surely, they must have a plan, he told himself.

HBHBHBHBHB

Joe had thrown enough baseballs in his time to be a good aim. Demyan had to duck to avoid being hit by the hurtling object. The momentary distraction was enough for Frank to kick Demyan's gun out of his hands and then tackle him. At the same moment, Biff let go of Kristen and yanked the other man's mask off. It was obviously not Jerry, but he was only armed with a handgun that was still in its holster. Before he could reach for it, Biff tackled him.

Kristen looked around her for some way that she could help. She spotted Demyan's gun lying on the ground and picked it up. She had no idea how it worked and wasn't willing to try to use it to their advantage, but at least she wasn't going to let Demyan take it back.

At the same moment, Jerry, who had had the foresight to take off his mask first, came running back out into the courtyard and helped Frank to subdue Demyan. Biff's opponent would have been outmatched by Biff under any circumstances, but as it was, he was also taken by surprise by being attacked by one of his compatriots, as he thought.

Joe watched the scene from the balcony. "Yes!" he said as his brother and his friends got the better of the gunmen. His momentary celebration was cut short by the sound of cracking wood, and he barely had time to hide on one side of the door before the attackers got through the door.

HBHBHBHBHB

Vanessa and Marius almost ran full-tilt into a group of men with guns, but rather than masks, they had vests with the word "_policía_" spelled out across them. After a few moments of confusion, Marius was able to explain to the police who he and Vanessa were and where they would find the terrorists. They requested that Marius come along to show them.

"Wait. You can't leave me here alone," Vanessa protested.

"You can come, but stay in the back," Marius translated the leader of the police's response for her.

HBHBHBHBHB

Joe braced himself for the onslaught that was undoubtedly about to come from the revolutionaries. Then, instead of a barrage of gunfire, a voice shouted, "_Stát'!_" There was a brief spurt of shots, but it didn't last long. Then a police officer in a bullet-proof vest came out on the balcony. Illya and Joe looked up at him, and he and Illya exchanged a few words in Laurenian.

Before anyone could translate for Joe, Vanessa came rushing out onto the balcony and hugged him. "It's over now," she said. "They caught all of the revolutionaries. We're safe now."

Joe breathed a sigh of relief as he hugged her back. Then he stood up, stretched his arms, and said with a lopsided grin, "Well, that was exciting."

"Is that all you have to say?" Illya asked him. "I can't believe you threw the Ruby Pendant over the balcony. You had better hope it wasn't damaged at all."

"I know it wasn't," Joe told him. He pulled the Pendant out of his pocket and grinned again. "I switched it out for one of these rocks lying around here at the last minute. You might have gotten through to me, too, about it being important to safeguard something like this."

He then handed the Pendant to Illya and they shook hands.

HBHBHBHBHB

It wasn't until late in the evening that all the Bayport students and Mr. Byron returned to their hotel. The reunion among them had been an emotional. Callie had scarcely left Frank's side since, and Iola, too, had remained close to Joe. Even though they were all exhausted, none of them wanted to go to bed, and so they were all gathered around in the lobby, talking over the adventure of the day.

Vanessa wrapped a lock of her hair around her finger as she watched Joe and Iola sitting together on one of the loveseats in the lobby and Joe put his arm around Iola's shoulders. Whatever Vanessa was thinking was cut short by Kristen sitting down next to her.

"I, uh, wanted to apologize," Kristen said in a quiet tone, hoping no one but Vanessa would hear her. They were sitting on the fringes of the group, and so that helped. "What I said earlier to you was pretty stupid. I didn't mean it."

It took Vanessa a moment to change her focus. When she did, she grinned. "Well, that's good, because it almost sounded like you were jealous of me, and if you're going to bother being jealous of anybody you should shoot a little higher than me." Vanessa's smile faded. "I have a confession of my own to make. That sound that attracted the attention of those gunmen. That was me. I accidentally kicked one of those loose stones that were on that balcony. If anything would have happened to Joe or Mr. Láska out there, it would have been all because of me."

"Well, I guess you're not as perfect as I was blaming you for." Kristen tried to smile.

"Hardly," Vanessa agreed.

"You know," Kristen went on, "my family moved to Bayport just a little less than two years ago. I've never been very good at making friends, and I honestly haven't made a single one since you've been here. Then you moved to town, and instantly everyone seemed like they wanted you to be their best friend. It just didn't seem fair. But I guess it was my own fault, to be honest."

Vanessa hugged her. "Well, you've got one friend now, anyway."

Meanwhile, the others had been too deep in their own conversation about the outcome of the situation to pay attention to the conversation between the two girls. Frank and Joe were explaining what they had learned or pieced together about Demyan and his men and about Sonja, including what they had learned later from the police.

"So, what's the deal with 'the four winds'?" Chet was asking. "I heard those gunmen say it, and Joe said Sonja had written it on the map, too. Does that mean they were working together?"

"Both Demyan and Sonja were pretty adamant that they weren't," Frank said. "The police here think that there is a group of smugglers or fences or something who call themselves the Four Winds. There's not a whole lot that is known about them, though. Somehow, they must have made separate deals with both Demyan and Sonja."

"I don't know what the drawing Sonja had made on the map was about," Joe added, "but if it is the Four Winds' symbol or something, it will definitely help to track them down. It would help even more if Sonja would explain what it is, but that might be asking a little too much."

"How about Marius?" Phil asked. "What's going to happen to him?"

"He and Natalia were Sonja's partners, although fairly unwilling partners," Frank explained. "Between that and the fact that Marius helped us all get out of there, Illya says he'll do what he can to get them off as easily as he can. I'm sure that also means that he's going to keep their motivations for helping Sonja quiet. I doubt the Laurenian government would go for leniency if they knew that they were trying to help a supposed heir to the throne come into his inheritance."

"Do you think there really is a lost prince?" Iola asked. "That would be pretty exciting."

"I doubt it," Phil said. "Sonja is out of her mind. I doubt there's any truth in just about anything she's said."

"Illya doesn't think it's even possible, either," Joe added. "Turns out, we were wrong about Illya. Or I was. I was the only one really thinking he was involved in all of this."

"Now the only question left is whether we're going to stay or go home as soon as possible," Mr. Byron said. "We haven't even started on the work we came here to do, and the government here has already stated that they would be glad to have us stay. Still, I don't think anyone could blame us if we decided to just go home after the day we've had."

"I think tomorrow will be soon enough to decide that," Frank said, and the other students agreed.

_A/N: I would like to thank you one more time for reading this entire story. I realize that it isn't the greatest story I've posted on here, so I really appreciate it that you've read the whole thing. Thank you especially if you have/will follow, favorite, or post a review for this story. That kind of support is really encouraging to us authors._

_I know I said at the beginning of this story that it's supposed to start a series. I've been having a major case of writer's block with this story and with its sequel. That's part of the reason that I don't feel that this is an example of my best work. I still intend to make it into a series at some future date, but I think I will have to let it rest for a while until a fresh burst of inspiration can make writing the sequel enjoyable for me, which will follow that it will be enjoyable for you. However, I have been writing long enough to know that inspiration doesn't come to me when I'm sitting idle. I have the most ideas when I'm right in the middle of writing other stories (a source of endless frustration for me ;) ). So, I'm going to be working on other projects while I wait, some of which are Hardy Boys and/or Nancy Drew fanfiction. Stay tuned! I'm thinking I'll be posting another story before too much time has passed, whether it's a sequel to this one or an unrelated story._

_Until then!_

_~hbndgirl_


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